


Patched

by Davechicken



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: After the fall of the Order, M/M, PTSD, Pre-Slash, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2017-02-26
Packaged: 2018-09-13 00:35:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 34,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9097732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Davechicken/pseuds/Davechicken
Summary: Broken things. Patched up. Work good as new.





	1. Chapter 1

Hux walks into the shop, adjusting his belt. It’s getting a little worn, a little loose. He’ll need to bore another notch into it, to keep it to his slender hips. Age is only making him leaner, and he was never too plush to begin with. 

The blaster is ruined. It took a clip to the barrel, and fragged it completely. He’s only still carrying it so he doesn’t look like he’s unarmed. His _spare_ is on the left, and it is still going to remain his spare. He needs something he can fall in love with, because if it’s going to save your life and earn your food, then it has to be special.

He opens up the door to the armoury with the best rep, and freezes when his eyes meet ones staring right at him.

To be honest, he might not have noticed straight off. The hair’s cut short, and curly. It’s dyed a woody brown, and the clothing is deep, navy blues and shiny blacks. It’s nothing like he used to dress in: for one, he can see Kylo Ren’s face.

Though… he doubts he’s going by either of those names, now. Nor the other one, the one that came first. If he’s living here, on scraps like Hux, then he’s in hiding from the Republic, too.

Kylo - or whoever - barks at the other people to leave, and they do. Only a Rodian and a small race Hux doesn’t even recognise are here, anyway. They leave, and Kylo moves (hiding a limp, but not well enough) as he locks the door behind them, turning the sign to _closed_ , and leans against it.

“You look good for a dead man.”  


“I could say the same thing,” Hux replies.   


He knows he looks a little road-worn. Ragged around the hairline, his red hair dusted with blond and grey. The beard is as kempt as he can keep it, and his clothes are not knife-creased, but still neat. 

Miles from the General he had once been. 

“Why are you here?”  


“You sell weapons. I want one.”  


“Nothing more?”  


“…well, I wouldn’t say no to an introduction or two. Got to make ends meet, you know.”  


Kylo holds his hand out, and Hux places the dead blaster in it. He watches as he turns it, looking from all angles. 

“I could salvage most of it, if it’s got sentimental value.”  


“Not so much that the cost of repair is worth it.”  


“I’ll use the handgrip and all that’s not damaged. You’ll barely know the difference, or it will be better.”  


Hux shrugs. “If it’s the right–”

“Just shut up and sit down,” Kylo says, nodding to a stool.  


Hux - for once - does not argue. He perches on the stool, and looks around the shop as Kylo works his magic.

It’s a mess, of course, but Hux can kind of see the logic behind it. Kylo’s mind grows like a tree does: branching out in multiple directions, winding back to a common thought. Hux’s mind has more of the librarian’s bent to it: trees chopped down and made into flimsi books. Things cut to fit the space, and not the other way around.

Hux had taken a long time to appreciate the organic almost-chaos that was Kylo, had found his unrelenting natural force a good check and balance on his own methods. They’d clashed - _oh_ they’d clashed - but Hux had appreciated it. No one else would ever have stood up to him like Kylo did, and (loathe as he is to admit it) Kylo was as much key to the successes they’d had as Hux was. In different ways.

He still maintains it was Kylo’s fault it all went wrong, but as the man didn’t seem to benefit much from the collapse, either, he won’t be so impolitic as to mention it.

Kylo works with his tools, shearing out all the unworking parts, grafting on new. Hux doesn’t know why he doesn’t just outright replace it, and start over. Working on the past never did Kylo much good, but… maybe it’s too late for him to change. Here he is, plying half of his biological father’s trade. Never really escaping, but how much better has Hux done?

Not very.

“Business good, here?”  


“I eat.”  


Isn’t that enough, most days? Hux has known an empty belly, and it isn’t a pleasant thing. He’s not sure why he’s trying to drum up conversation, when Kylo doesn’t seem to want to reply.

Nostalgia, or some other fatuous emotion. 

It’s still some fine coincidence, though, finding him here. All these years later. He knows the ‘Force’ exists, but he’s never believed in it the way he’s sure Kylo does. Hands fly over parts, a dexterity he could apply to so many other–

“Why here?”  


“I’m through fighting.”  


“It’s the only thing I know,” Hux replies, feeling defensive.  


“It’s what you know _best_. But… I can’t. I don’t believe anything, not any more. And if you don’t believe…”  


“I believe in eating, now.”  


Kylo shrugs, and pulls out his soldering tool. “You could find other work.”

“It would be dull.”  


“ _Now_ you’re telling the truth.” Kylo looks up now, and there’s a faint smile. “You’d be bored.”  


“If I keep myself busy, then… I think less about what I lost.” Why is he admitting this? Why is he telling a truth he didn’t know until right now?  


“I’m tired of being someone else’s weapon,” Kylo says, and slides the blaster across the work surface. “You might pick your jobs, but you’re still under someone’s trigger finger.”  


He is, and having it pointed out to him rankles. “What else could I do?”

“I don’t know. I just know you’re slowly killing yourself by walking into cross-hairs, instead of away.”  


“If you hadn’t ruined it all!”  


“If it was good enough, I wouldn’t have been _able_ to ruin it, Hux. The strong survive. The weak die. Wasn’t that always your motto?”  


He doesn’t like that, so he picks the blaster up and storms into the small testing area, pinching off a few blasts. The sights are - annoyingly - perfect. The recoil is minimal, and the energy beam is tight and strong. Yep.

Back in the holster, and he walks to the front of the shop.

“You don’t have to run,” Kylo says, washing his hands fastidiously.   


“I do.”  


“Alright. But you don’t have to run _forever_. Take it from someone who spent most of their life running. One day, you’ll get tired. You’ll want to keep put.”  


Hux has run less than Kylo, so perhaps he is correct. His thumb feels for the handgrip of his blaster, reassuring himself it’s there. It’s not that he feels threatened by _Kylo_ , it’s that he needs… to know. 

Hux feels for his teeth with his tongue. “Maybe… I’ll come ask your advice for a change, if that day ever comes.”   


“I’ll be here,” Kylo says.  


It’s a simple statement, but it’s so much more. It’s ‘I’ll help you’, and it’s ‘you know where I am, and I trust you not to tell’. So, too, is Hux’s: he doesn’t _ask_ for help, not ever, and letting Kylo know he might appreciate it… that’s a lot.

They’ve said so much in their un-words. It’s always been like this: understated, implied. Kylo speaks the double-tongue as well as Hux, and that level of comprehension, of ease… he misses it.

He’d wondered - once - he’d wondered…

“We worked… pretty well together, didn’t we?” Hux asks, trying not to sound like he needs the answer as much as he does.  


“Pretty good,” Kylo agrees. “You break that weapon again, you come back here. I’ll fix it, if you tell me how you broke it.”  


Oh, but that hurts. It hurts in such a keen, and cutting way. Hux can’t control the smile threatening, like a storm on the horizon. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Open the shop on your way out, would you?”  


“Anything you ask,” he says - and oh - that means _so_ many things more.  


He knows Kylo knows, as he turns the sign to _open_ and walks out lighter than he’s felt in years. He’ll be back. They both know it.


	2. Chapter 2

You don’t question the work overmuch. If it pays, then you forget about the rest. Well, you make sure you’re not supporting some disgusting sexual slavery ring, or pissing off a long-term contact, but… you know. Other than the very extremes, you keep your head down and just get on with it if you want to survive.

Hux is good at surviving. He’d thought his skill was in leading, and strategic planning. It turned out his real skill was in not ending up dead, which was probably more useful in the long-run.

The problem with balancing ‘I want to eat’ and ‘Nothing too risky’ against the other was sometimes your belly put you in situations that - in retrospect - maybe you shouldn’t have risked.

Yeah. Like now. When he’s standing on the promenade, overlooking the busy concourse below. The blaster had to be left behind, but he’d still smuggled a holdout one in his boot, and then the vibroblade up his sleeve in the flick holster… he can feel them both, and he knows they’re a step too far away to really defend him.

Something about the meet is wrong. It’s a weird sensation, but it’s wrong. It started to feel wrong when he hit the dock, and it’s gotten progressively worse until now. He’ll have to take the knock to his rep, but better to lose rep than life. He’s about to push away from the handrail when he feels the heavy weight of a presence behind his back.

“You’ll want to take the long way back.”  


The voice is familiar, and oh-so-welcome. He’s never been more grateful to hear Kylo Ren speak, and he realises with some grim satisfaction that he’d never doubt him. Not now, not really. 

Kylo had been a great many things when they’d worked alongside one another, but he’d never been a real danger to Hux. An annoyance, yes. A challenge, also. A liability at times, and a risk, but no one was perfect.

“You’re a long way from home.”  


“Came to sort out a shipment,” Kylo claims, his hand grasping Hux’s elbow, tugging him away from the balcony.  


“Uhuh.” He doesn’t buy that, not for a minute. It’s way too convenient, and he lets himself be pulled away all the same.  


They go down the steps and Kylo’s coat is off his shoulders and over Hux’s before he can blink. A soft, woollen cap pulled down to his ears, and their arms link. 

Kylo is also wearing a cap, and they walk quickly through a door marked _Maintenance_ that he likely hacked earlier, and then Kylo hisses _run after me if you want to get off this planet alive_.

Kylo’s legs are longer than his, and he has the Force, and that’s the _only_ reason Hux will give to why he’s struggling to keep up. It’s nothing to do with the years on him, the parsecs on his clock. He runs after Kylo blindly, smacking one wall with a flat palm as they turn ninety degrees into a corridor, kicking off doorframes and haring through the secret, staff-only facility. Several people yell in surprise, and Kylo flings at least one of them with the Force.

They’d never done anything like this, when they were in the Order together. Kylo had gone on plenty of missions, but by the time Hux had his commission, he had been ‘above’ fieldwork. He’d watched the figures from afar, extrapolated, condensed, directed.

He’d never felt the meaty taste of exertion in his lungs, or felt the lactic burn in his thighs. Never seen Kylo in his prime, and doing so now… well. It’s enlightening, even bringing up the rear. The man tears through scenery like wet flimsi, and nothing stays in his path for long.

Once they get to the last door, Kylo’s arm shoots out and Hux nearly clotheslines out on it. 

“What?” Hux asks.  


“Your ship is going to be under surveillance.”  


“So?”  


“So… I need to tow it.”  


“…you want to _tow_ my _ship_.”  


Kylo shrugs. “It’s that or risk never getting it back again.”  


“…fine. But you’re telling me why you’re here, and helping me.”  


“Ship first, story second.”  


***

Hux’s craft is only small, barely big enough to be considered a shuttle and not some oversized skycar. It does mean that it can be towed pretty easily, but he doesn’t know how Kylo intends to go ahead with this. 

He follows him through the edges of the dock, towards - yep. That’s a freighter. Not quite the Corellian YT model, something much newer. Hux follows Kylo to the cockpit, confused.

“What now?”  


“You know how to fly this baby?” Kylo asks.  


“I’m sure I’ll work it out…”  


Kylo then proceeds to give him a tour anyway. Which is probably good, because there’s several things he wouldn’t have known.

“Then you wait for my signal, and take off,” Kylo concludes.  


“And my ship?”  


“I’ll go down, tether them, keep eyes off me, unlock the grav plates, and sit inside until you fly us somewhere hospitable.”  


“…this… seems an awfully complicated plan. When did you come up with it?”  


“Right now.”  


“Figures.”  


“When we’re home free you can judge me all you want,” Kylo says, and bounds out of the cockpit.  


***

Semi-annoyingly, half an hour later, they’re docked, in each other’s ships, in hyperspace.

“Now will you answer my questions?” Hux demands.  


“Sure. Why not?”  


“Why the hell were you there, right there, right when I needed you?”  


“The Force.”  


“Don’t give me that Force bullshit, Kylo! Tell me the truth. You just came half way across the galaxy, and I don’t see any cargo.”  


“I found you, and needed to get you away, so my cargo will wait.”  


It’s a lie, but he can’t slap the man like he wants to. “Couldn’t you have just called me to tell me it was a set up?”

“Didn’t know how to get the message to you, without interception, and in time. Figured… this was the most effective way to save your skinny ass.”  


Hux rolls his eyes. That’s honest, at least. Honest and weirdly touching. It’s far more than he deserves from Kylo, even if they were once comrades in arms. “I owe you, don’t I?”

“Yep.”  


“Not going to let me off the hook, are you?”  


“ _Nope_.” He’s laughing. Kylo is laughing. It’s there in the curls around his words.  


“Start thinking about what you want. It’s a long flight home.” Hux is almost laughing, too. He’s alive. Against all the odds, he’s still alive.  


Thanks to Kylo.


	3. Chapter 3

Back at Kylo’s shop, Hux’s ship sits - now untethered - in the back cargo bay. Still minus cargo. He’s seriously wondering if Kylo even _did_ have a shipment to pick up, or if it was entirely fictional. 

His thumbs sling under his gunbelt, and he feels better now he’s got his regular sidearm back. Feels more like himself, even though he’s entirely at a loss. His last job was a bust, he now isn’t sure who wants him dead (or why) (this time), and he owes Kylo his life, and his ship.

 _Why?_ The question reverberates around his skull. He’s never been sure how much the other man intrudes: is he always inside Hux’s mind? Was he there all the time they worked together? How would Hux even know?

Kylo refuses to answer. Either he doesn’t hear Hux’s question, or he doesn’t want to reply. Or… doesn’t want to give the game away.

The mercenary leans his ass on a bench, his thumbs now prodding at the inner lining of his worn jeans’ pockets. 

“So. I owe you.”  


“Yeah, but you’re out of pocket for that deal going south.”  


“True, but if you hadn’t saved me…”  


“You can repay me down the line.”  


“Not good enough.” Hux doesn’t do credit: taken, or given. His life is too sharp for that, now, and sentiment leads to people taking advantage.  


“Alright. Well. I’ve got a shipment I _was_ going to–”  


“You know I’m not a cargo pilot.”  


“Yes, but you _can_ fly, so–”  


Hux snorts through his nose, loudly, and shakes his head. It’s beneath him, but more than that it’s _beneath what his life is worth_. His life is worth a damn lot, and this is insulting to them both. “I’m going to do it properly.”

“Then you’re going to have to wait til I have _need_ of your services. I can’t magically come up with something, just because you think you need it.”  


Hux narrows his eyes. “I’m not–”

“Hux, look, you’re welcome. But you’re not a freaking Wookie. You don’t owe me some shitty life-debt.”  


He pulls himself up to full height then, glaring down his nose, even if Kylo is _fractionally taller._ He’s less tall without the helmet, so Hux no longer feels the difference so keenly. “Forgive me for having manners. I was brought up correctly.”

“And I live as quiet a life as I can, these days. You’re more trouble than I’ve seen in five years, at least, and that was _nothing_ compared to what we used to do.”  


“And I’m telling you I don’t like owing people. Even you.” Especially you. Someone else might die or never collect. Kylo might never _think_ to collect, and being beholden to him is more than his pride will manage.  


“Then what would adequately expunge your debt?”  


 _Death_. Wait. No. “Something actually useful for you.”

“You know… you could do it in increments.”  


Increments. “You mean like, smaller jobs that add up?”

“Yeah. I got a lot of deals I can’t take because I can’t afford to leave the shop for long, and I don’t trust anyone to hire as a second set of hands.”  


“You want me to _babysit your shop_?”  


“No, I want you to be my procurer. Of… the interesting.”  


Hmm. ‘Interesting’ means ‘slightly dangerous and/or illegal’. It also means repeated work. 

“I’d still need to earn my keep, so you’d have to–”  


“You could have board here.” Kylo isn’t looking at him, now, examining a blaster rifle to avoid eye-contact. “I got a spare room. You could still run other jobs, for money. But have a base, and… a bit more of a rep.”  


Kylo is offering him a home, and a sort-of-job. And a way to repay his life being saved from people who were most certainly going to kill him in nasty ways. This is absolutely insane!

“What’s the catch?”  


“Me as company. Sometimes.” His work-worn hands push the strands of hair that have escaped the ponytail back behind his ear, the gesture so innocuous as to be incredible.   


“…can I think about it?”  


“Yeah.” The blaster goes down onto the counter, and Kylo walks out of the room.  


***

Hux has fucked up, hasn’t he? He knows. Kylo went and saved him, then let him free, and then offered him a fucking _home_ , and Hux has to go and say ‘Can I think about it?’ 

That and not being ‘Thank you for your kind offer of letting me off the hook, but you devalued my life with it, and I would like to show you the extent of my gratitude’ instead of just ‘No’ about suggested reparations.

Kylo has every right to be pissed with him. Every right. 

Kriffing freaking sodomising hell.

Why can’t he just say ‘thanks’? Or - like - leave? Kylo probably wants him to leave, doesn’t he? That’s why he’s gone out back, to give Hux the freedom to retreat and never be seen again.

It’s not like… you know. Anyone is looking for them. They’re both legally dead, and two Humans - one with fading red hair and one with longer, dark hair… they could be any two Humans. They aren’t slaughtering planets or anything, and Kylo doesn’t even seem to carry a saber so much, so…

Kylo is the one person who knows who he was, who he used to be. He even uses the damn name - they both do - which would have to stop. Live by their aliases properly. Kylo knows who Hux was… and Hux is ashamed.

He’s seen things a lot differently since the fall of the Order. Seen some gaps in the ideology, as well as the methodology. He’s not the same man he once was, though he is aware he did all those things they say he did. He thought - or made himself think - at the time that they were _justified_ , but now… it’s a horrible reminder of a man the galaxy wanted dead.

Him.

It’s why he’s never really settled, or made any connections that lasted. Anything would be based on a lie, based on a false floor over rotting foundations. And here is Kylo, threatening to dig his fingers into the mulching floorboards and rip the ground from under him.

Nostalgia. Nostalgia for a time that didn’t really ever exist. They’d been - at best - competitive. They’d been antagonistic to one another, not harmonious in the slightest. He’s longing for something he never even had, and what does Kylo even–

The door opens up, and he sees the man has been fighting tears. His eyes are red, and… has he ever seen him…? No. He hasn’t. And he’s done this.

“You can just go,” Kylo says, his voice thick with hurt.  


“Kylo…”  


“That’s not who I am anymore. Look. I’m sorry I apparently offended your masculine pride by saving your skinny ass, I just – I didn’t want you to die, that’s all!”  


Hux pleads with him. _Listen to me. Listen. Kylo. Kylo._

Either he doesn’t hear, or doesn’t care. Hux feels choked, too. “I’m sorry. It just made me feel like I wasn’t really worth that much if shipping something was enough to repay the debt, and it makes me uncomfortable to be in a position where you have power over me.”

Yes. Deal with the emotional man by talking over-rationally. Perfect battle plan, Hux.

“You think your life meant nothing if I _ran across the galaxy_ for nothing more than a whisper that you might lose it, and risk my own life and being outed as who I used to be, just to make sure you didn’t _die_?”  


Oh. _Oh_.

Kylo used the Force. In public. Yeah. Hux feels all the blood drain from his face, and he grabs at the table he’s sitting on. 

“I didn’t… I didn’t think…”  


“No. You didn’t think. You act big and tough like you know everything, and like you’re the most intelligent person around, but you can be _dumb as a fucking nerf_ when you want to.”  


This is when things are supposed to make sense, isn’t it? Hux can tell that, but he’s always suspected there’s a bit of him missing. A bit that understands the world, or relates to it. If he had it, maybe he wouldn’t have made Kylo cross with him twice already, over something as nice as _saving his damn life_.

But here he is, dumbstruck, hating himself, and wondering if the tiny things he thinks are even remotely close to true, or if he’s doing his ridiculous Pining Over People Who Will Never Want You Back, You Stupid Bastard. 

“I’m _sorry_ ,” he blurts out, and now his own voice is tugged at the edges with emotion. “I don’t know what you want from me. I don’t understand…”

“I offered you a _home_ , Hux. A job. Somewhere you might get shot at less. Somewhere you don’t have to risk your ass just to fucking _eat_. Do you _really_ need to take those jobs? You could settle somewhere…”  


“I need to keep running, or I meet myself.”   


There. Now it’s said, it doesn’t get unsaid. He had to. He couldn’t stay still.

Kylo walks towards him, subtly, as if approaching a feral animal. His hands lift, and Hux flinches as his own are grasped in warm palms. “Running just makes your legs tired. You won’t ever know who you are if you don’t stop and _look in the mirror_.”

“What if I don’t _want_ to see who I am?” Hux asks, his tone going a note towards screech. “You don’t understand!”  


“I do! Fuck, Hux. Don’t you think I do? I was where you are. Why won’t you let me help you?”  


“ _Why?”_  


“Because I can help you through–”  


“Why do you _want_ to?”  


“You fucking idiot. You think I’m so unfeeling that I don’t care? You were the closest thing I had to a fucking friend whilst we worked on that shithole of a ship, and you were just as fucked over by those assholes as I was, and because - because you’re _more_ than that. Can’t you see?”  


“I see a mercenary who doesn’t care where their credits come from,” he replies, a little numbly.  


“I see a man putting his life on the line because he thinks he needs to be punished, and he isn’t ready to face it straight on.”  


That **hurts** , and Hux shoves at him. Really shoves. He fights, and the other man grabs his arms all the tighter, making him thrash as he tries to get free. “Let me go you overgrown oaf!”

“Hux… _stop_. Stop running. You’ve died. You’ve died. You can’t undo what you did. Please… for my sake, let me _help you_.”  


He kicks his shin, but he won’t let go. Elbows. Teeth. Blaster. The arms squeeze tighter around him, pinning him, immobilising him. He hates being so open, so seen, so known. He hates that Kylo can look inside of him and rip him apart so effortlessly. Hates that now he can’t hide from things he’d known.

Drops, and sobs onto Kylo’s shoulder. 

The arms move to something like an awkward hug, and Hux howls some more. He’s been so alone, so very, very alone. All his life alone, probably, if he’s honest. One spark - one brilliant flare of antagonism with someone prepared to give as good as he got - and he’d thought he’d lost that forever.

Kylo holds him until he’s all cried out, and Hux sniffles. “But… please. Just tell me why?”

“I’ve done a lot of bad in my life, Hux. A lot. A lot of bad has happened to me, too. I figure if I don’t do any more bad, and I do even little good…”  


“I’m your charity case?”  


“You’re someone who I greatly admire, and who I think has suffered unfairly, and has made some - admittedly grave - mistakes. But someone who doesn’t deserve to die in some ridiculous half-assed atonement gamble.”  


He doesn’t deserve this. This… kindness, that goes beyond. 

“I’m not going to magically be nice, you know.”  


“You wouldn’t be you if you were.”  


Hux shoves his face into Kylo’s neck and just… breathes. Has anyone even held him this long in his miserable life? Probably not. The thought threatens to break him again, and he grabs at Kylo’s hips. 

There’s the tiniest little kiss to his shoulder, and Hux feels his face bloat horribly, in a way that can’t be at all attractive. Shit. Was that a friend-kiss, or…?

Kylo moves to hold him at arm’s-length, and Hux lets his hair drift into his eyes, ducking, embarrassed. He’s well beyond his prime, and this is ridiculous. 

“Let me help you,” Kylo asks again. “Run away if you have to. Go. But come _back_. Come back when you can, and I’ll patch you, piece by piece.”  


Like his weapon, of course. He’s had it adjusted and tweaked until maybe none of the original parts are really there any more. Each time, Kylo squeezes a little more juice out of it, surprising him. 

“I’ll have to… fly a lot of supply runs. You know. To… pay rent.”  


“Yeah. I know.”  


“And I’m not nice.”  


“Pretty sure I’ve seen you at your worst.”  


“And I snore.” He looks up when he says it, looking for a response. He can pass it off as an escalating joke, if he needs to. But there’s that gnawing beast in his gut, the one that wants _more_ , the one that looks at every twist of lip and glance of eye. The one that hopes beyond hope.  


“I can get ear defenders,” Kylo replies, with a flippant-but-not-quite tone.   


Okay. So. It is a maybe on that, after all.


	4. Chapter 4

Kylo has the decency to give him space, without pulling all the way away. After his brief breakdown, the shopkeeper-who-had-been-a-Knight made Hux some soothing tea, and explained the basics of his business. (No credit, no discounts, haggling to five or ten percent lower than markup, stock accepted if not on any watch lists for stolen goods, bought in for at least forty and at _really_ extreme thirty percent less than the target resell price, till-operation, holocam operation...)

The small slew of details is comforting in the way it’s Solid, Fixed and Defined. Things that are (mostly) unarguable. He knows Kylo is diverting attention away to something outside of Hux’s inner world, and he’s giving him structure. He knows, because it’s precisely what Hux would have instructed people to do to his troopers, back in the day.

Kylo’s always been smarter than most people give him credit for.

Hux has no real intention of minding the shop, but if he’s going to spend his downtime kicking around the place, it makes sense he can hold the fort while Kylo takes a leak, or something. He does his best to memorise the details, and scopes the best angles for defensive purposes should anything go south. Kylo’s made the place well-fortified, with cover and angles all set up to give him an advantage from behind the counter, of course.

As well as the rows of equipment that are on open display, there’s some sealed cabinets, and some behind the counter. A small, public workbench out front, a bigger one out back. The shooting gallery, and a very small landing pad and cargo area, big enough for two medium cargo ships, perhaps. His own little craft nuzzles up against Kylo’s, and there’s just about enough room for another craft of Kylo’s style, but everyone would have to tuck their tummies in.

Out back there’s also a small ‘fresher, and a tiny kitchenette. It’s functional, and not much else.

Above the shop there’s another floor, which Hux assumes is where all the domestics are, unless Kylo sleeps on his ship. He’d been tempted to wander around the vessel as they flew back, but he’d decided to let the man have some secrets. 

Maybe he should have been nosy.

Hux is – begrudgingly – impressed by it all. The building isn’t massive, but it’s large enough that Kylo must be making a decent level of earnings. There’s good gear here, which is why he’d have been coming back even if it wasn’t Kylo running the place. The prices aren’t extortionate, and his policies are fair. It’s enough to live comfortably, without sticking out too much and drawing unwanted attention. 

But it’s still lonely, he suspects. Even with regular customers, and a constant stream of social niceties, there’s no real depth, is there? Or is he just hoping he doesn’t have a rival?

“I set the sign to shut all day,” Kylo says. “So. You want to see the upstairs? I’ve got a spare room, at the other end of the corridor, so you’d get some privacy. I mean, it’s not like it’s a high-rise on Coruscant, but it’s better than some shitty motel on Jakku.”

Hux winces at the mention of _that_ place. Both of them, to be fair. “That would be lovely.”

Upstairs is as he imagined. There’s a single, big ‘fresher room with a shower that may or may not be sonic, a tub, toilet and basin. Out and there’s a small living room which seems to consist of a couch and a large holoscreen, and stacks of untidy bits of ephemera. At one end of the corridor is what must be Kylo’s room, and down the other end is the spare room.

“I’ll move out the junk,” Kylo promises.

Hux peers inside. The bed’s actually wider than he’s slept on in years. Maybe not wide enough for two people to constantly cope with, but bigger than one person alone _technically_ needs. A vanity and more piles and boxes (holos, bits of armour and weaponry, a small collection of footwear that has seen better days), but the room itself is clean. It’s also way bigger than his room on his own craft, and any he’s rented for any period of time. 

“It’s perfect.” It’s more than he can really afford to pay for.

“I’m not using it for – you know – income, so really if you run the odd supply venture for me, and occupy the space, you’ll be turning me a profit I’ll be happy with.”

“Don’t forget I’ve got to repay you the _other_ debt.”

“Yeah. I thought maybe you’d forget about that?” Kylo asks. “Not that it means I don’t value you being alive, but... consider it several years of name-day gifts. Backdated.”

“Kylo...”

“Hux, I’m serious. I don’t want you here under a sense of obligation, or of... being indebted, or somehow trapped, okay? You can consider you letting me help you as a way to help me. I feel better when I do stuff for others, and you’re giving me an opportunity to do that.”

That doesn’t entirely sound like the Kylo he once knew. “Have you gone... Jedi?”

A laugh, and his hair falls over his eyes as his head ducks. “Nah. I’m too emotional for Jedi. Just consider you my cosmic debt to the galaxy.”

“Pretty sure the galaxy’s net worth would go up without me.”

“Pretty sure it wouldn’t. Pretty sure making you an honest, mostly law-abiding and productive member of society would be better than ending you.”

“I’ll be running _guns_ , Kylo.”

“Not just guns.”

“Okay, blasters, ammo, and armour.”

“I do make and mend other things, you know. Like: mining tools. And I fix consumer electrics. And droids.”

“...where did you learn all that?”

His head lifts, and the shadow of a long-dead man stares across over Kylo’s features. “It’s in my blood.”

That’s... eerie, and Hux gulps. “Okay. If you’re not going to let me live in debt, then... you’re going to let me do one thing for you, and then we call it even.”

“...what thing?”

“I haven’t worked it out yet. So. You agree I’ll repay it with something yet to be determined, and the rest of the work is to pay my board?”

“...alright.”

“Then: I would be delighted to become your roommate. Though I should really know what name you’re going by.”

“Okay. In public, I go by Kylian. Ky, for short. I don’t use a last name, except for tax returns.”

Couldn’t give it up, could he? “Brendin.” Because he’d wanted... some link to his past, too. 

“Bren?”

Hux swallows. “Yeah.” No one’s called him that, but... “Kinda not sure I like it, now.”

“Too many bad memories?”

Hux nods.

“How about I call you ‘Hux’ until you decide who you are?”

“Okay.” Not going to be easy, is it?

***

That night, Hux can’t sleep. He’s moved his meagre excuse for personal belongings into the room, and he’s put his toothbrush and toiletries in the shared ‘fresher. His boots sit, slightly humbled by Kylo’s old ones. The sheets are clean and fresh, and he can’t hear Kylo in the other bedroom. He hears the creaks of the building, the sighs of pipes and the rumble of ships passing overhead. The earthy chorus of being in contact with the ground, even by proxy, and not in the dead of space. 

And he can’t sleep. 

For no real reason.

Fuck’s sake, he thinks. Just go to fucking sleep. Go to fucking sleep. 

Why can’t he just relax? Because it’s all too good to be true, and he’s waiting for the other shoe to drop? For someone to put a hand over his mouth, and kill him in his pyjamas? Or because Kylo looked too closely and exposed things he’d have preferred to keep hidden?

What’s so bad about having a... friend?

Hux can’t sleep. He can’t. He’s not supposed to get a Happily Ever After. He lost. He lost, and to his shame he ran before the end. He should have let them execute him, but instead he just went and tucked tail, denounced his name, and threw himself into the first, most dangerous job he could find.

He did those things. He did them for a reason. He did them because he _believed_ , and he might still believe. If Kylo – Ky – woke him up tonight, and told him they could end the Republic and win... he’s not entirely convinced he’d try. The Order had been as flawed as the enemy she fought, and Hux is painfully aware that there’s not all that much difference, when you get down to it. The most fundamental of their differences had been that one side had a Supreme Leader, and the other revered the cacophonous, gross appeal to the wider average voice. What the public bayed for, the public got.

He lost. He ran. He’s nothing more than a failed soldier, and he’s not sure he can _be_ this thing that Kylo is. Without his goal, his mission... he’d faltered spectacularly. He’d found smaller goals, short-term ones, and blinkered himself to more.

And now he is lying in a bed, hating himself because without the calculations of risk and benefit, he’s got only his own mind and failures as company.

Creaks. Groans. Footfalls. Hux turns his face to the door, but it doesn’t open.

He can’t breathe. Kylo must know he’s awake? Is he disturbing him in the Force? Or...

“Hux?”

“...yeah?”

“You wanna... watch a holo?”

It’s late. But he does.

***

Kylo insists on sitting on the floor on a few pillows, whilst Hux takes the only couch. Kylo might be younger, but his legs are longer, so it’s hardly fair. However, Hux is still new and a guest, so he accepts the decision with as much aplomb as he can.

“Sometimes I can’t sleep, either,” Kylo admits, as he flicks through available holos. 

“Normally I tire myself out enough that it isn’t a problem.”

“Yeah. Run until you drop. Been there.”

It’s crude, but it works. Get up early, work hard, collapse. Repeat. Hux has run around a lot today, but it’s been more emotionally tiring than physically tiring. He pulls at the gappy bit of sock between two toes. 

“I just... keep thinking something will come and snatch this all away. Life... didn’t give me many breaks.”

“You’re alive,” Kylo points out. “That’s small miracle enough. And if you don’t let yourself enjoy things in case you lose them... are you even living?”

“Ky...”

“No, Hux. I’m serious. Deadly serious. You had a lot of shit thrown at you... Maker. That monster threw enough for a whole _eternity_ at everyone, but especially us. I’m fucking glad he’s dead.”

“...you... you... changed sides?”

“Do you see me in orange?”

“No, but—“

“I’m glad Snoke is dead. I don’t want to go ‘back’ to them. I don’t want any part of either side of the fight, but I’m glad he’s dead.”

The tone is almost... droid-like, but... no. It lacks even that emotional inflection. It’s like listening to an AI you programmed yourself at the age of seven, when the most Intelligence you could manage was basic conversations about the weather. It leaves Hux feeling oddly cold, and he pulls one foot underneath him.

“I don’t know if I can be glad for any of it. Can’t we just pretend it... didn’t happen?”

“Not if it’s making you upset or distressed. If it’s unresolved, you need to resolve it.”

“I could resolve it by denying it,” Hux suggests. “Worked wonders so far.”

“Worked so well I’ve seen the evidence all over your forearms, Hux. I’m willing to bet there’s even more scars you don’t let show.”

Fucking... “That’s got nothing to do with the war.”

“ _Everything_ has to do with the war. We were _born_ into it. We were _soldiers_ , Hux.”

“So?”

“So... it affects you. And unlike the Resistance... we didn’t have families to go home to. We didn’t have counselling, or hand-holding. We just had to survive.”

 _You had a family_. The thought is an uncharitable one, because he’s picked apart from shreds and glimpses that Kylo’s relations with his blood-kin has never been too great. At least they recognised him as their son (he thinks), even if they ended up on opposite sides of a war. Hux is willing to bet they loved him, even then, when being on the _same_ side didn’t afford him the same privileges with Brendol Hux. 

“The war is over.”

“Only outside of us.”

The fuck is that supposed to mean? “I wasn’t _just_ the war effort, you know!”

“Hux... it’s okay. You don’t need to defend yourself from me.”

“I do when you’re talking out of your ass.”

Kylo turns front and centre, and Hux wonders how this is helping either of them. Leaving it safely tucked away has been fine so far. So he took one bad job? So what?

“The decisions you make stay with you. The lives you take. The sacrifices. You feel too much to really not care.”

“Maybe you’re projecting.”

“Maybe, or maybe I saw how each loss cut you. Not just because you wanted to be perfect, but because you _believed_.”

“And we _lost_ ,” Hux reminds him. “We lost.”

“No one really wins a war. They just survive it.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean? Have you _seen_ the history-chronos? Sheev Palpatine won the war, and he founded the Empire.”

“He was then murdered by his Apprentice, so he didn’t really win.”

“So... what? Your argument is: you’ll die some day so you never succeed at anything?”

“No, it’s not... okay. Fine. Whoever doesn’t die in war, or get their civil liberties stripped from them, and ends up in a superior position... they got something. But if they were _fighting_ , they lost plenty to pay for that. The only real winners are the ones who didn’t _lose_ things.”

Hux thinks about this. Does he consider himself to have lost much? Well, in a sense. The rank and prestige, the promise of a position of power. The standard of living, the sense of purpose...

“I don’t just mean things you had. Things you _never_ had. Hux... did you ever have the option, when you were young, to be anything but an officer?”

“...I could have been a nothing,” he replies.

“So, no support. No family, no assistance.”

“How does that—“

“If you’d been born to a rich politician, what then?”

He’d be a politician, too, he suspects. If he didn’t come to see the choking hypocrisy of such a thing. 

“You’d have had a career, a life that didn’t revolve around bloodshed. Maybe you’d have been an artist, an engineer, a pilot... you could have been so many things.”

“Is that what you wanted?” Hux asks. “A... ‘normal’ life?” The way he talks about it, the longing in his tone...

“You never did?” Kylo looks up, his head tilted backwards. “Yeah, I wanted it. Wished I’d never had the Force plenty of times. Wished I’d been free to be... I dunno. Maybe I’d’ve programmed droids. Maybe I’d’ve been a dancer, or a sports star, or a scoundrel like you.”

To have such power, and to wish it away... “Was it really that bad?”

“Hux. I was covered head to toe in black from before I was legally an adult. I had my name removed from me. I disowned my family, and I served a tyrant and a monster. You think I was having fun?”

“...you... always seemed...”

“Fanatical?”

“Loyal.”

The head tips forwards. “Only thing I was loyal to was myself, and my continued survival. That and the power high.”

“Power high?”

“...the Force. The Dark Side... the emotions... not all of them were good, but Maker, were they strong.” His eyes close, and Hux can see them slide beneath his lids. “So powerful, so overwhelming. So impossible to deny.”

The way he speaks, it’s... enraptured. Entranced. Obsessed. This is the Kylo he’d thought was loyal, but it turns out his addiction wasn’t to the Supreme Leader’s will, but something much baser. Great. 

“Right.”

“Hux... don’t you feel... you know. The things you did?”

“They were necessary.”

“Were they, in hindsight?”

“Well, they didn’t make the changes I wanted to see.”

“So were they _necessary_?”

That’s more than he can handle, so he gets up. “Enjoy the holo. I’m going to bed.”

Kylo lets him.


	5. Chapter 5

Somehow, Hux finally falls asleep. He falls asleep, and sleeps all the way through the rest of the night. When he wakes, he jumps upright in a panic, having forgotten everything from the previous day for a minute. Then it all crashes back, and he grabs for his chrono.

Shit! He’s slept past midday. What the hell?

In only boxers and a sleeveless shirt, he staggers to the ‘fresher, desperate for a piss.

Which is when he walks past the most glorious smell to ever grace a Human nose, and if it wasn’t for the fact he really needs to pass water, he’d probably just throw his face right into the fragrant cloud. Instead, he stiff-leggedly runs into the ‘fresher to handle the matter.

A few minutes later, distracted momentarily by the fluffy handtowel (he’d never have thought of Kylo as a hedonist), Hux walks into the kitchen area to see Kylo trying to cook. Well. He _is_ cooking, it’s just that it’s something of a mess. Nothing looks burned, and it all smells delicious, but he seems to have too many things going on at once, and is struggling to keep up.

“Want a hand?”

“Uh... I’m okay...”

Is he trying to impress Hux? Is that it? Because it’s sort of working in that it smells awesome, but the chaos that’s involved is hilarious, and Hux grabs a pan and pulls it off the heat right before the flames erupt, and the fire alarm starts blaring.

“FUCKING!”

“Turn it out, I’ve got this,” Hux says, even though he kind of doesn’t. He’s never cooked properly for himself, mostly just ready meals, ripped packages, cups you add hot water to and powders you shake until they turn into something half-decent.

Flames off. Probably a good start. The eggs and rashers and – yep – toast all seem to be ready, so he starts putting them out onto plates.

Kylo’s made way more than two people need, and he’s sort of touched by the effort.

“Lemme guess, you normally eat a ridiculously sugary cereal?”

“Sometimes I have toast.”

Hux goes to the caf machine, and pulls himself a short, sharp splash, before looking up for direction. As guessed, Kylo’s version is milky and sweet. Hux brings the two mugs over to the dining table, settling in to look at the small feast.

“Even when I was an ass?” he asks, hands hesitating over the cutlery.

“You weren’t an ass.”

He kind of was. He picks up his cutlery and starts to slice through, scooping a generous amount and stuffing his face. It’s no greasy diner food (which always tasted so much better than it actually was for you), but it’s good. 

“Okay, a little bit of an ass,” Kylo agrees. “But I deserved it, and I’m not giving up on you just because you’re not magically fine.”

“There’s nothing wrong with me. Other than the assishness.”

Kylo decides not to push the point until they’re done eating, which is good. Hux still feels a bit upset, though, because... does Kylo really think he’s that broken? He’s survived. He’s kept himself going. He’s not done anything he really didn’t want to, and now Kylo thinks he gets to preach about what is, and isn’t broken?

“You aren’t living up to your full potential, is all.”

“No, I suppose I’m not. I should be ruling the galaxy, but instead I’m running guns.”

“That is _not_ your potential.”

“Oh, and ‘shopkeeper’ is really a full actualisation of _your_ talents?”

“Your capacity for _happiness_.”

“Who says I’m not happy?” Hux is. He is. As happy as he can be, considering. 

Although he’s not sure he’s able to be the quietly content sort. Kylo seems to be okay with this life, but Hux... he’s always known _goals_ and targets. Those had originally been external orders, plus his self-motivation. Recently, the goals have been less expansive, but they’ve still been there. ‘Taking out the trash’ isn’t going to cut it. He’s just... he’s wired up wrong? He’s not got the bits of him that should be fine just watching a good holo. 

“You could always leave,” Kylo points out. “If you don’t think this will be ‘exciting’ enough for you.”

“You keep a shop.”

“I do.”

“...you... you were the second-most powerful Force-sensitive. You were heir to the Leader himself. How is this anything like enough for you?”

Kylo’s head dips, and Hux thinks for a moment that he’s asked and now Kylo will admit he wants more action and adventure, but then there’s brown eyes on him, and they don’t look sad.

“I miss some of it, but not enough. I didn’t want his job, his position.”

“Why not?”

“I didn’t enjoy the things he made me do. I mean... some part of me, sure, but another part really didn’t. I didn’t want to have to fight him for a position I’d have to surrender the last of my moral fibre to. Murdering and torturing children...”

“So you could have done it differently.”

“Could I? Hux, you don’t have the Force. You don’t understand: the Light is giving yourself up, controlling yourself, denying yourself. The Dark is bathing in your emotions and not thinking. It’s acting like an animal.”

“So... didn’t you once say you had both? Light and Dark?”

Kylo nods.

“So just... find the middle ground? Don’t go animal, but don’t go self-abnegating?”

“What do you think I’m doing?”

“Honestly? Hiding like a coward. Not using your full potential. Not ruling like you were meant to.”

“ _Now_ who is projecting?” Kylo shakes his head, sadly. “I didn’t _want_ to rule. I wanted the Force, don’t get me wrong. I wanted...” 

The man trails, and Hux leans forwards. “What?”

“You’ll think it’s ridiculous.”

“Kylo, I’ve seen you cook breakfast. You can’t sink much lower than nearly burning your eyebrows off, and I’m sitting in my bedclothes, eating your – admittedly very good – breakfast. If we can’t be frank now...”

“When I was very small, I wanted to be a Jedi. Who didn’t? And a pilot. And an engineer. And a Wookie. And a garbage truck driver. And a Dejarik player. And any number of other things. I wanted those, and then... I wanted to feel...”

Shit, maybe this is deeper than Hux is able to handle. He puts a brave face on it, all the same.

“I wanted to be less alone. I wanted the pain to stop, and I wanted to... feel like I belonged. I didn’t want to be a hero, I just... wanted to feel safe, and not alone.”

He’s alone here. Is that why—

“What _do_ you want, Kylo?”

“I want... I still want to make a difference. I want to not hurt anyone any more, or be hurt. I want to be free, and...”

Not alone. It’s not entirely selfless, is it? Kylo is expunging his guilt via Hux, and clinging to someone he knows knows him. Someone who – if they stay – it isn’t under some false pretence. Someone who knows his worst, and still stays.

“I’m not sure settling down is for me,” Hux says, as diplomatically as he can.

“That’s why you fly missions, but come back, too.”

“Yeah, but... Kylo, you really think I’m just going to suddenly turn into a house-husband? Or whatever? That you can just offer me a home and I’ll stay in it, and no longer have any ambition?”

“Is it ambition that makes you take missions, or thrill-seeking? Suicide-by-mercenary work?”

“I’m not suicidal!”

“No, but if it happened, you’d probably be less worried than you are. Didn’t yesterday wake you up to it? You could _die_ , Hux.”

The ex-General shrugs. “Everyone dies.”

“And the thought of spending some of your not-nearly-dying time with someone who knows you... is abhorrent?”

“We tried watching a holo, and we had a fight. We tried breakfast, and we’re fighting.”

“This isn’t fighting.”

Semantics. He’s arguing about their argument. Of course he is, but he _is_ a diplomat’s son. He’s arguing about whether their argument counts as an argument. Does Kylo even realise the absurd irony of it? 

“Hux... this is a disagreement, not a fight. A debate.”

“Yeah? Isn’t it the same thing?”

“...no. We don’t have to agree on everything, and we don’t have to resort to personal attacks.” 

“Where did you learn _that_?”

“Well, I learned how _not_ to talk to another person through my parents, it has to be said. Learning _how_ to do it came much later, when I was away from anyone who’d known me, and I had to work out how to get by on my own recognisance.” 

Huh. “So. You... learned by opening a shop?”

“Here, everyone is honest about their dishonesty. Both parties know they want to benefit, and there’s social agreements, yes, but you know people want the best deal they can get. They aren’t about to unleash a superweapon, or destroy whole groups of people... they just want cheap merchandise, but not so cheap they can’t come back.”

“You’re saying you... learned your social skills through commerce? How very capitalist of you.”

“I like the rigidity of the income and outgoings, and the flexibility of the personal element.” Kylo takes a sip of his caf. “I like the honesty. I like the variety of people. I like that I’m not forced to extended contact with people I dislike, but that I can extend contact with people I _do_ like.”

“You can’t just turn your customers into your therapists!”

“Why not? Barkeeps are patrons’ therapists.”

“Because... because they’re your customers!”

“I help them, too, you know. Advice, if they’re regulars. It’s not like I pile my problems on them, I just... talk to them and learn more about myself by how I act, react, and how they react.”

It’s weirdly ingenious, frankly. Hux doesn’t know everything of Kylo’s past, but his family _were_ infamous, even within the Order. All of them. Plus, his childhood sounds like it was as weirdly militarised as his own, and he had the pressure of being the legitimate son of two heroes, and not some bastard who no one expected to amount to much.

His family hadn’t taught him. His uncle – the ‘great’ Luke Skywalker – hadn’t taught him. The Supreme Leader hadn’t taught him.

He’d gone looking for his own lessons, in the people who passed by him.

Of course, Hux has always been sure he didn’t need those kind of social skills. You just needed to lead, and to follow, and to know when to do each. And now he just... needs to know who is secretly planning to kill him.

“I’m not a shopkeeper.”

“Start small.”

“Small.”

“Try one person. And know as much as you teach them, you’ll learn from them.”

“Are you _sure_ you’re not a Jedi?”

Kylo’s eyes tighten. “I’m sure. I do remember what they taught, and... some of it has merits. I’m not perfect, but I’m... happier here.”

“I can’t be making your life better.”

“On the contrary, I like a challenge.”

“...I’ll... try,” he offers, even though he knows that sitting here in boxers and a vest basically already means he’s agreed to it. 

“I know.” Kylo’s slightly smug. “See. Neither of us left this time. Although I’m a firm believer in sometimes you _do_ just need to stop a discussion and walk off until you’re able to say something helpful.”

“What the hell kind of customers do you have who teach you this stuff?”

“ _Armed ones_.”


	6. Chapter 6

It’s fortunately not long before Kylo has a mission to send him on. Go to Ord Mantell; meet the buyer; barter well; find anything else of interest; return home. Hux is thankful for the excuse to get out and about, but he isn’t so pleased that he has to take Kylo’s ship. His own is far too small for any sizeable cargo, but it’s not _his_. 

And in someone else’s ship, you always feel on edge. What if he scrapes it? What if he _crashes_ it? Plus, the pilot’s seat isn’t broken in for his butt, and the dials and settings are all _slightly_ off his preferred options. The fuzzy dice are ridiculous, but oh-so-very Kylo. 

Once he puts the craft into hyperspace, he has to explore properly. Last time, the shock of nearly dying and being suddenly rescued had stopped his natural curiosity, but now he’s co-habiting with the man, and given the keys to his ride, he figures he’s been given tacit permission to thoroughly investigate.

First is obviously the cockpit. The fuzzy dice are pointless, if kind of cute. There’s a dancing little Wookie statuette stuck to the dash, and a few stickers glued onto surfaces. Many of the controls have been doctored away from the original (the dial rims don’t all match, so he’s changed the scope and range, and the instrumentation underneath), and the chair has some weird, inbuilt massage and heat setting. Hux had found that by accident when trying to adjust the height. It’s an interesting touch, but he’s not sure he’d rush out to buy it for his own craft. 

Nothing else stands out there, so he picks up his travel mug of caf from the dedicated cupholder ( _that_ he might go in for upgrading his own ship to) and wanders further back.

His life as a merc’s given him some more understanding of smuggling, mostly when he’s worked jobs to protect cargos. As such, he runs his fingers along the bulkheads, feeling for where he thinks there’s hidden compartments. Push at the edges, measure from the outside, look for ‘dead’ space. He feels the slight changes underfoot in places, and he notes that there’s quite a lot of scope for running secret goods in this bird. Makes sense.

The corridors and goods areas aren’t really personalised like the cockpit had been. It’s all utilitarian, until he gets to the kitchen-cum-dining-area. Here, he’s surprised to see some well-loved pots and pans. Kylo might not do breakfast cooking, but it seems he does other cooking. There’s spices Hux has never even heard of, and there’s weird utensils he doesn’t recognise, all hanging and tidied away in a surprising state of order. Kylo was always a bit too chaotic and ragged, but he’s made use of his cramped space here to within an inch of his capacity. 

Hux is going to have to ask about the spices. The first few nights have been pretty decent, but normal space-farer food. He wonders if his comments about breakfast made him feel insecure about his culinary skills, and resolves to do his own attempt before long.

Okay. Definitely only mugs and plates for one, or two at most. Even though the ship is big enough for four to travel comfortably, he suspects Kylo wouldn’t often let people onboard.

Back, into the ‘fresher. It’s got only a sonic shower (makes sense), and the other normal amenities. A few more grooming lotions and potions than Hux would normally stretch to, but Kylo always did love his hair. 

(No... personal and social health items. Interesting.)

He hesitates outside what looks like the master bedroom. He’s seen the one that’s ‘spare’, which is where he’ll likely sleep. He isn’t sure he’s ready to invade something that private, and he goes back to the cockpit, feeling a little cold. 

Kylo matters too much to be rude to him. Even without the life debt.

***

Weirdly, when all the transactions are done and he’s commed back to let Kylo know he’s coming, punching in the calculations for the hyperspace jump is a relief. He’s going back, and it sort of feels nice? 

Like going home.

His finger bounces the dancing Wookie, and he wonders if Kylo ever misses the real thing. It seems like such a painful reminder to sit there, and perhaps that’s the point. It’s not directly the Wookie who was more or less his uncle, not a holo of relatives who mourned his passing, but an abstract memory.

Hux has no record of his ‘family’. He has nothing of the old days, except the blaster, which he won’t admit to anyone that it was once First Order issue. Kylo knew, when he fixed it. He’s sure of that.

He has no real history at all, other than what’s in his memories. A whole half of a lifetime (well, he hopes he lives more than twice the age he was when the Order fell), and nothing to show for it. He can’t even really use his old name, though he’s damned if he knows what he’s going to accept in its place.

Although... will anyone even know?

The thought plagues him, as the Wookie slows to a halt. Hux.

His father had been a Commandant of some regard. He’d lived in his shadow for so long until he’d come to eclipse him. Hux. It had been a name he’d craved to live up to, to own, to claim... to _steal_. To make _his_ , not his father’s. To become... more Hux than Hux himself. Make everyone forget there’d ever been anyone else.

Well, he’d certainly over-written the Hux legacy, taking the name to meteoric heights, only to dash down to terra firma with a very resounding crash. 

And now he wonders how many people even remember there once was a General called Hux who destroyed five planets? If his name was mentioned, would anyone but ex-Order troopers and officers, or high-ranking Resistance veterans know it? Would they even assume a battered old blaster for hire could be the same person, or would they assume he’d have raked together another Empire, another Order, another army of white-clad soldiers?

Does anyone even care?

Kylo’s name will be remembered. Kylo’s _powers_ will be recognised, if he uses them. He did have the advantage of hiding behind a mask for years on end, so his face is less obvious, if... somewhat reminiscent of the gene donors behind it. 

Say ‘Kylo Ren’ and people may well shudder. Say ‘Hux’, and they might say ‘bless you’. 

Which is so fucking unfair, because Kylo had the Force to get him where he got. Hux had himself. 

Still, Hux _did_ kind of – you know – lose. Not that it was _his_ fault, but the Order... _is_ gone, now. And not being known means he’s still alive, so. Swings and roundabouts.

He leans back in the chair, and turns on the settings for a randomised massage and butt-warming. If it’s here, he’ll take advantage of it.

***

“Everything okay?” Kylo asks, clearly nervous.

“Yes, everything is fine. Got him down to thirty thousand.”

“Good, but... remember you have to let them feel like they won, too.”

“Why? He agreed to it.”

“Yes, but he’ll have felt forced. Next time, let him be more aggressive a little. Not outside of our margins, but enough that he feels he’s superior to you.”

Hux frowns. He doesn’t like letting people feel superior to himself, because they are not. (Even if they are.) “It’s business, Kylo. I’m not trying to seduce him.”

“It’s not...” Kylo shakes his head. “Just trust me. He is very insecure, and he’ll have felt threatened by me sending a merc. Next time, be a little disappointed in whatever you agree to. He’ll feel like he’s won, even if he _hasn’t_. Get him to feel he’s got the upper hand, even when he’s doing what you want.”

Sneaky little... “You really are devious, aren’t you?”

“I’m going to take that as a compliment.”

“You should. I’ve used people’s weaknesses, but I’ve never built someone _up_ to take advantage of them.”

“Let me help you get the goods inside.”

“I also picked up something for dinner,” Hux says, as off-handedly as he can. “Unless you had plans?”

“No. No plans.”

“Great.”

***

Hux has read the instructions at least twenty times, and Kylo isn’t allowed in the kitchen while he’s cooking. He’s not made a real meal in the longest time, and he doesn’t want Kylo to make him feel even more self-conscious. 

He’s cooking. Like. A meal. For no other reason than to repay Kylo for breakfast. It’s an escalating exchange of aggressive niceties, which probably means he’s doing it wrong. Can you be nice ‘wrong’? He probably can.

The stew bubbles away, and Kylo appears at the door again.

“Can I at least get you a drink?”

“I’m supposed to be playing host!”

“...it’s kind of my place, sort of?”

Hux turns his nose up. “You can get me a drink.”

“See, you’re getting the hang of making them feel like they won,” Kylo teases, stepping in and going to the fridge. “Beer?”

Hux’s eyebrows lift, surprised. He did kind of... “It’s different when it’s you.”

“Why?”

Because I care if you feel like you won, Hux won’t say. He takes the offered bottle, hiding his expression in a swig. “It shouldn’t be long before it’s ready.”

“You cook much?”

“No need to.” This would be the perfect time to...

“You do know you can ask me stuff, right? If I don’t want to answer, I can always just not.”

Alright. So he’s opened up the floorshow. “Your ship’s kitchen...?”

“Mhm?”

“It seemed... a little... unexpected.”

“How so?”

How to say this without sounding offensive? “Well, for one it was tidy, and you were never really the organised type. And for two... you cook?”

“Used to. Guess I just... got bored of it.”

“Bored of cooking?”

“I enjoyed it for a while, but it became just too easy to whack something on the hot plate, or open a packet. But if you like... communal eating, cooking for both of us might make it fun again.”

Huh. “So you were lonely?”

A thumb rubbing at the flimsi label on the bottle, using the condensation to ease the two apart. “Of course I was lonely. It’s... I mean, I was lonely in the Order, too, but I remember... not being lonely.”

Right. 

“What about you?” Kylo asks.

“Not having people around was strange, but I was never socially linked with anyone. I had to remain respectful of my superiors, and authoritative in front of my subordinates.”

Kylo actually has to cover his mouth to hide the little laugh, which is... hurtful. 

“Hux. I’m going to ask you something.”

Hux wishes he wouldn’t.

“You don’t have to answer, or... should I wait until after we eat?”

“You know you can’t leave me hanging all the way through dinner, Kylo. Out with it.” And damn the consequences.

“Have you ever actually... had a friend?”

Hux can feel the vein in his temple throbbing, and his left eye twitching. What an outrageously impolite thing to ask! How dare he? His fingers tighten on the cool bottle, and he swallows at the slightly acid taste in his mouth. “They weren’t necessary.”

“We’re not solitary animals, Hux. Social. That’s what sentients _are_.”

“Not all species.”

“Pretty much all sentient species,” Kylo insists. “Look... I’m not... I’m not trying to shame you, or make you feel bad.”

“Aren’t you?”

“I’m trying to say... shit. I don’t even know.”

“Fine. If you must know, the only time I ever felt... we weren’t friends, but you... were...” Stimulating to talk to? External to his chain of command? Infuriating, but also interesting?

“You were my only... ‘friend’ in the Order, too.”

“You hated me.”

“And you hated me, too, right?” 

Hux is no longer sure if he even understands what it was he’d felt. Complicated, is probably the best word for it. 

“You’ve got one now,” Kylo adds. “If you want one. I’ll even cook for you.”

“You’re that sure my stew will be that bad?”

“No, because I think I’d like to cook for you.”

Kylo Ren. Dark Side Knight. Scion of the houses Skywalker, Organa and Solo.

Offering to cook, because it might be pleasant. Hux feels the enormity of domesticity weigh him down again, and the urge to _bolt_ is high. This isn’t him! He isn’t wooden spoons and full bowls! He isn’t chopped vegetables and cold beers! He’s not ‘let’s talk about our feelings’!

And there’s Kylo, winding his fingers into the pullcord hanging from his track-pants. 

Hux fights a tongue that doesn’t want to move. “Why am I so---?” Lost. Terrified. Intimidated. Horrified.

“You’ve been alone so long you tried to convince yourself it was what you wanted, or needed? Or maybe you’re just afraid I’ll burn the pastries?”

Hux laughs. “Shut up. Let’s just eat, and toast the first down-payment?”

“Sure.” Kylo grabs the cutlery and bowls ready.

Hux wants to scream. 


	7. Chapter 7

There’s nothing really keeping him here, when he thinks about it ‘rationally’. Sure, it’s a bed, and it’s more comfortable and less claustrophobia-inducing than living inside your small vessel. And Kylo _is_ company. The debt – such as it is – isn’t one he can work out a suitable repayment for, and even the piecemeal instalments now just act as rent.

Hux wants to run.

It’s an absurd instinct, but it’s there. He’ll be standing in the shower, and trying to remember how much fuel is in his ship, and how far he could go if he grabbed a towel and went now. He’ll be watching some Rodian pretend they’re a good shot on the range and that it’s the _scope_ , obviously, and he’ll wonder how Kylo would react if he came home one day from a grocery shop to find Hux gone. How long would he look for him? (Would he?) How long would he wait? ( _Would_ he?) Hux will be behind the controls of his vessel, or Kylo’s, getting much-needed stock, and he’ll look at the little navicomp and feel the urge to just type something random in, smash the hyperdrive, and stay there. 

Over and over, he thinks about leaving. Even though he didn’t – and doesn’t – want that. The thoughts spark up in his mind without his permission, and torment and plague him every other off-moment. It’s not even like it’s consistent or constant. It’s just _repeated_.

He doesn’t have anywhere to run _to_ , and all the perks of a stable base and a good shower to lose. Kylo’s even pulled out the herbs and spices, and now they take it in turns trying not to burn dinner, and to find things they can get better at cooking. 

There’s nothing really to run _from_ , other than the terrifying way Kylo has of making him feel things he’d long since buried, and the gut-aching fear of... well. Being _found out_. Not ‘found’ (because he’d probably just suicide by law enforcement if he thought life imprisonment was on the horizon), but in being found _out_. Being... picked into pieces by someone who knew him too well. _That’s his fear_.

Being opened up, and what Kylo would think once he’d done it. Would he be bored, when Hux was ‘fixed’? Or would he be disgusted by the depths of his behaviour? Hux doesn’t know. 

He just watches the hyperspace jump calculation grind to a halt over his navicomp, and fights the urge to just... 

No. It’s not that bad. It isn’t.

***

Hux stares down the barrel of the blaster, his eyebrows arching for political independence, or at the very least devolution from his nose and mouth. “What’s going on, here?”

There’s only one blaster pointed at him, and many more the other way, which confuses Hux no end when he gets back ‘home’ after another gruelling supply meeting. The rest are all pointed firmly at Kylo, whose hands are on the counter-top, flat-palmed.

“Trade negotiations,” Kylo replies.

Which isn’t code, but also it is. Just because they haven’t come up with a system of secondary communication, it doesn’t mean Hux can’t read firmly between the lines. 

“Well, should I get caf for everyone?” Hux offers.

“That won’t be necessary,” says the only man (other than Kylo and Hux) not holding a weapon. “I believe you were about to agree to my terms.”

“Hmm, can’t say I remember them, now. Sorry, my mind isn’t what it was,” Kylo snipes, polite enough in tone, if not in word and meaning.

“Don’t be cute. Although...” the leader turns. “Didn’t this one turn up on the bounty list after interfering in a kill order? For a Human male, about...” he gestures with one hand, “...this high... red hair...?”

Shit. They traced Kylo somehow, because obviously him saving Hux _did_ have consequences, and Hux has blithely been trying to ignore them (as sometimes bounties or spats have a budgetary limit, and if you’re not kill-or-catchable within the budget then the feud is cancelled out, as if it never happened). 

“We’re not the men you’re looking for,” Hux tries. “If you’re looking for men. I mean, I don’t judge. It could be women.” Maybe Kylo has been rubbing off on him, because normally he wouldn’t stand to sass them, but there _are_ five people with weapons drawn, and their leader, and even _he_ can’t fight that many off.

“Reckon we’ll get more for taking you in alive. And if you’re not who they wanted, we’ll just space you somewhere.”

“You do realise I _had_ this?” Kylo asks.

“It looks precisely like you ‘have’ this,” Hux retorts.

“I do. I have this.”

“You have nothing,” the leader says, turning back to Kylo.

This is when – much to even Hux’s surprise – every single blaster flies out of its respective mercenary’s hands. And towards Kylo, handgrip first. Which means they’re now pointing back out at the attackers, levitating in fresh air.

“Okay, you had this,” Hux confirms.

“Told you.” Kylo fires a bolt from every one of the weapons right back at their owners.

Hux, meanwhile, sees the leader reaching for his own sidearm and shoots him before he gets it, leaving six dead men in their shop. Five from their own sidearm, and one from Hux’s.

“I got one,” Hux croons and preens. “I want points.”

“You can have one point,” Kylo replies, as the weapons all drop. “I’m afraid it doesn’t look like I kept you that safe after all.”

“...I’m still not dead.” For which he’s still infinitesimally grateful.

“No, but—“

“Ky... if they want to kill me, no matter where I go, they’ll find me eventually. So either we make it so not worth their while they give up, or I spend my life constantly looking over my shoulder.”  

Which means: not running. Staying put. Telling them he wasn’t going to be bullied. Funny how it’s easier for him to sell it to himself out of spite, than out of self-love. Well, if it works.

But that means... “If you’re okay with... the danger?” Because Hux is well aware he brought this to the Knight’s life, this risk and uncertainty.

“I’m okay with the danger.”

“Even them finding out you have the F—“

“I said I’m okay,” Kylo cuts in, kindly enough. “And I am okay. Besides, who else would look after your skinny ass?”

“Who indeed.”

“You think we should dump these somewhere... noticeable? As a message?” Kylo asks.

“I think that sounds like a splendid idea.”

***

Many hours later, Kylo shoves some instant bread and pulls out the cheese and meats they like to fall back on when they’re too tired to cook, and they sit across the occasional-breakfast-bar together, swinging their legs off the edges of their stools.

“Aren’t you ever tempted to just... use it?”

Kylo looks up. “The Force?”

“Yeah.”

“Who says I don’t?”

“Well, I don’t _see_ you using it.”

“No, because I’m careful.” Kylo lifts his left hand, gesturing with his fingers, picking up a small bread bun and rotating it without ever one making contact. “You mean parlour tricks like this?”

“If I’m honest, even after all our years working together, I never fully knew what you _could_ do.”

“I kept it that way for a reason with everyone,” Kylo replies, and lowers the bread. “But I can move things. Stop things. Even stop energy weapon fire. I can read people’s thoughts, and influence them...”

“Would they know you did it?”

“It depends. If I put something innocuous and normal into your head, like, ‘I need to take a piss’, then you probably wouldn’t notice it at all, unless you were very, very trained. Some species are almost impossible to mind-control, and those tend to be Hutt-like species. And even if you did notice, you’d forget after I’d done my work. I’d make you forget,” he adds, ominously.

“Huh. And if you wanted to – say – extract information?”

“Again, I could make you forget, but you’d be _very_ much aware of it in the moment.”

Hux pulls the thin slice of red meat into more pieces than he needs to, digesting the information.

Kylo is the one to break the silence. “You can ask, you know.”

The mercenary looks up, head cocked, eyes roaming over his face. “Would you tell me honestly?”

“Would you trust me to?”

Hux runs one fingernail under another, pulling imaginary dirt from below. He thinks about it, then looks up, jaw set fiercely. “Yes. I think you would tell me the truth.”

“A few times. Under orders. I didn’t go deep into your mind, but I did control your short term memory afterwards.”

Hux feels his expression freeze. “I see.”

“I didn’t – I’m sorry,” Kylo says, his lips thin. “I can say that all I want, but it won’t change the fact I did it. Snoke commanded me to, and I obeyed.”

“Why?”

“...why... did I obey, or why did he command me?”

“The second, mostly, but now I need the first, too.” 

“He wanted to test my loyalty, and yours. Stretch my skills. Prove I would do anything he asked of me. And I would – more or less – because... because the punishment was far worse than the command.”

Huh. Hux hadn’t earned much ire, other than over the Starkiller, but he suspects the Knights of Ren functioned differently to the First Order. Hux had never needed reconditioning, but he had always known what it entailed. His initial training had been enough to make him comply (up until there was nothing really to comply with any more), but the way Kylo says it...

“Would you have? Done it... if he never ordered you?”

“...sometimes I would... skim people’s surface thoughts if I was _really_ bored, but I... normally did that with the stormtroopers, or lower officers.”

“Not me?”

“...I didn’t want to with you. Or Phasma.”

Phasma. There’s a name he’s not heard in years. Unlike them, she _did_ go down with the Order they all ‘believed’ in. Hux misses her, for all their methodologies didn’t always align. Maker, but she was one of the better ones.

“I’m not sure how I feel about that,” Hux says. “I mean, what did you even _see_?”

“I understand,” Kylo says. “Maybe I should have told you sooner. I only... looked into specific things. There were times when there were leaks, and the Leader wanted me to use key terms and information to provoke your memories, to see if they were coming from you.”

“He... didn’t trust me?”

“Or he was making me isolate myself, and playing games with me. Or he was paranoid and didn’t trust anyone. Or he... who even knows?”

Who indeed. The man – if you could charitably call him that – is dead, now, and no one can answer to his motivations. Hux finishes destroying his slice of now unwanted food, and then forces his shoulders straight.

“Will you do it to me, so I know what it feels like?”

“...uh... sure?”

“I just want to know. I know you could make me forget, but I’d like to at least know I recognised it. From you, or... other Force-users.” Kylo is right: he would forget. But Hux likes the thought of him knowing at least _once._

Kylo’s hands go down onto the table. “How hard do you want me to push?”

“Not so much I’m screaming, but enough that I have no doubt. If you could go gradually?”

“Alright. I want you to _not_ think of where you got your ship. I want you to avoid it at all costs. I’m going to push in, and if you need me to stop, I want you to think... _Finalizer_.”

 _Really_. Kylo’s idea of a safe-word is his old flagship? Hux can’t help the sneer on his lips, and he has to take a swig of his juice to hide it. “Okay. I’m game.”

It’s like – at first – when the pressure changes before a storm. The unsettling, uneasy prickling of hairs over the back of your neck, and the heaviness in your head. There’s a thought like a song that won’t go away, but it’s weirdly without a real ‘voice’. Just thoughts, without accent or tone. He can tell it’s _different_ , like a memory, or something not-him. It’s not like when he feels the urge to flush every bottle of shampoo down the toilet, or turn the volume up in the ship to see if his eardrums bleed. It’s definitely _other_.

 _Ship_. That’s there. A word, and an image. The visual could be plucked from his own memory, and maybe it is. His own ship, and the smell of the seats when new. The squeak of the chair and the high shine on the dials and—

He’s supposed to avoid thinking of this, and he tries to pull his attention away. Tries to think about the slightly greasy feel of meat on his fingertips, or how the cheese has been cut at a slight angle and every time they try to rectify this, it goes the other way. Tries to—

The deeds and title. Excitement. His first big purchase. His first ship that’s _actually_ his. After all, this one is in his name, whereas the _Finalizer_ was—

Abruptly, Kylo’s presence withdraws. Hux is left shuddering, blinking in confusion. He hadn’t meant to back away from that, but he’s also sort of glad he did. There was nothing wrong with those memories, but it was feeling so violated, so... mind-raped... He’s sure that was just a fraction of Kylo’s capability, and their eyes meet again.

“Promise me you won’t ever do it without my express permission?” Hux asks, hoarsely.

“Unless it’s literally the only way to save your ass.”

“Kylo!”

“No, I’m sorry. I know I shouldn’t, but if I have to, to keep you alive...”

“I’m not something you can control!”

“I meant _temporarily_. I’d give you your memories back after.”

“Why are you even arguing this?” Why would his mental process go right to excuses, or exceptions? Is there something he isn’t telling him? Something on the horizon?

“Because... I don’t deal in absolutes. But I _will_ be honest with you: I’ll save your ass, because... I... need to. But I won’t do more than keep you out of harm’s way until it’s safe to tell you everything, again.”

Hux would like to survive, of course he would. But his memory has already been tampered with, and he’s not sure how much ‘protecting’ Kylo thinks he’s going to need. “Don’t hide it from me. And don’t think you can just... do it and apologise and I won’t be upset.”

“Hux, since you’ve moved in, that’s the first time I’ve been in your head, other than when you sing internally so loudly I literally can’t stop blocking you out.”

“...what?”

“You do realise when you think about songs, you wag your ass?”

“I do no such thing!” Hux can’t believe that. How dare he? How dare he say he _wags his ass_ , right after showing him mind-control?

“You do. And then I can’t help but listen to the song... and, uh...”

“ _What_?”

“...watch you dance...”

Hux crunches the crusty roll into exploding crumbs in one fist. _Maker_. That’s the most embarrassing thing he’s ever had happen to him. And he lost a _war_.

“Don’t.”

“It’s _cute_ ,” Kylo complains. 

“If you watch me dance, I will...” What? “I will make sure I think songs you _hate_.”

“You’re a monster,” Kylo says, and shakes his head, smiling.

Hux is smiling too. It’s... nice. “I mean it. Don’t even think about mocking me like that.”

But from the weird, slightly-distant look... it isn’t mockery. And that’s so very, very odd.


	8. Chapter 8

Hux is stuck in a holding pattern, and he isn’t sure he likes it. He’s already had one paradigm shift in his life, and now he has to move away from ‘homeless grifter’ towards ‘settled salary-man’. (Sort of.) 

He keeps trying to work out why the previous life appealed to him so much. To begin with, it had just been work he could do without needing any scandocs. He’d known how to shoot, and how to fly, and how to not die. Those were all very marketable skills, as was desperation. He’d been able to slip into a community that valued a lack of regulation and official scrutiny, and it paid well. 

Then he’d just never stopped. It had never once – not ever – occurred to him to start a real business. Even if he’d now got passable documentation that would probably allow him to slot into the Republic’s grand System (hah), he’d just never thought to change. 

And now he realises it wasn’t because he loved the life he lived, but because he was afraid of anything else. Hux had only ever excelled: in the Academy he had been decorated and lauded, in his commissions he had been promoted early, with distinction. In mercenary work, he didn’t get to see others to compare. He counted it as a win when he came home with the same number of limbs attached as he left that morning with, and the solitary side effect was... tolerable. 

To attempt anything else was to admit he didn’t really know _how_. He’d never had a bank account in his whole life. (What the Order classed as one hadn’t really been anything other than a tiny amount of private spends, and even that had gone when the war ended.) He’d never rented, or bought a home. The most he’d done was research a good second-hand spaceship and buy it credits-in-hand. 

Hux knows how to kill people. He doesn’t know much else, and he’s pretty sure he’s too old to learn. Unlike Kylo, who had – at least – once been given other skills, and who could use the Force to fudge his way around things, Hux has... nothing. Other than a lingering guilt about all the officers and troopers who did make it out alive.

What are they all doing? He saw posters up from the Republic, offering veteran re-training and re-homing, but at the time he’d suspected it was either a way to arrest them, murder them, re-condition them, or get cheap, hard labour. He’d not thought it was a positive offer, but now he’s hoping his cynical mind was wrong. The alternative is just too chilling to bear.

It’s a quiet afternoon, and Hux is currently working very hard at finding the perfect centre of gravity on his stool. He has his boots up on the workbench, and his arms folded behind his head, trying to feign relaxation. Kylo has two – three? – blasters in pieces in front of him, tweezers in one hand, soldering iron ready. He can talk while he’s working, so long as you don’t mind long pauses when the physical takes precedence. 

Hux has nothing else to do.

“Can I ask... you something?” he cuts into the silence.

“You just did.”

Fucking... “Fine. Can I ask you multiple, number-unlimited things?”

“If you accept I might not answer, or answer how you like, then yes.”

Hux lets the stool land onto all four feet, and grabs his blaster. Not because he’s threatening, but because he feels better when his hands are on it. “Why didn’t you go back to them?”

“...by ‘them’, I assume you mean my birth-family?”

Birth-family. What a strange phrase, as if to imply he’d been adopted. “Yes. Them.”

“Do you really want to know, or do you want the soundbite?”

Hux pauses. Does he? Of course he does; from morbid curiosity, if nothing else. He doesn’t understand Kylo, not like he used to think he did. He’s beginning to suspect he never understood him at all. “We share a shower, I think... I’d like to know.”

“Although they couched it in ‘helping’ me, they didn’t know _how_ to, and their idea of helping was to send a troubled child away. Or to make him feel broken, and wicked. They had their ideals, but they were more married to... my mother was married to the Cause, and my father... probably had his most functional relationship with a Wookie who couldn’t ever leave him because of a Life Debt.”

“So... you’re still angry with them?”

“Hux. Do you actually know what... what happened to me?”

“I know the official line, and I conjectured some other things, but no.”

“Snoke... let’s just say he head-hunted me. My father reacted by freaking out and saying I was basically evil incarnate, they screamed a lot, he ran off, and then my mom sent me off to get the thoughts beaten out of me with repeated meditation. And even if I’m _charitable_ about their actions, they were _not_ fun to be around, not together. Mom was busy with her work, Dad hated me, shouting was how everyone communicated, and I didn’t have the self-control and self-denial needed to... to be a Jedi.”

“Right. So... how is that different to... Snoke’s version? That you saw the Dark Side was better?”

“I’m not sure either side is better, Hux.”

“Can you – you know – _not_?”

“Not... use the Force? Or not pick?”

“Both.”

“...I could... avoid using it, and for the most part I do. And... I can use either side.”

“Without a problem?”

Kylo turns off the soldering iron, and puts down the blaster parts. “Do you know the difference?”

“Not really. We are—we weren’t told much. Just that the Dark Side was Snoke’s, and so that’s what we were supposed to respect. I had no idea what you could even do until you turned up on my ship.”

“The Light... the Jedi way? It’s all about focus, control. It’s...” And here, Kylo laughs. “ _Military_. You’d probably be good at it, because it’s all about repression, and feeling superior to other people.”

That should hurt, but weirdly it doesn’t. “And the Dark?”

“It’s... emotional. It’s why you had so much reason to complain about my ‘outbursts’. The Dark values feeling, impulse. You give in to your passions, both negative and positive. It’s... easier to access high sources of power, but harder to – of course – control.”

“So... why don’t you use the Force, or is it just that you don’t want to be found out?”

“...partially,” Kylo admits. “The more I use it, the more chance I’ll be uncovered. If the Republic’s law enforcement doesn’t find me, then someone with a grudge might well. I’m not a Jedi, so it’s pretty obvious who I am.”

“And... the other part?” Is he asking too many questions? Kylo can always stop answering if so, can’t he?

“It’s hard to... it’s hard. It’s hard to restrain the Darker sides of you, and it’s hard to stay on the straight-and-narrow of the Light. It takes constant effort, never-ending vigilance. It’s _exhausting_. Or it is when you fall somewhere in the middle, like me.”

This sounds a lot more complicated than Hux ever considered. Here he was, sure Kylo wasn’t going home out of a mixture of shame and spite, but it’s... it’s so much more than he realised. Much like the universe, it seems. He believed in the blinkers pushed over his head, and now he’s blinded by the truth, and he’s ashamed of his own lack of insight and compassion.

“So... you... avoid the temptation, so you don’t... get found out, or...”

“It’s like a drug.” Kylo’s eyes are a little haunted, now. “You can’t stop. You need more. You think you’re in control, but really you’re spiralling way out of control. So...”

“But are you _happy_?”

After all, wasn’t that his accusation thrown into his face before? How could Kylo judge his enjoyment if he didn’t know how to be happy himself?

“I thought I was.”

The pain there... it hurts. It hurts like fingers clawing for scraps of meat on his lean ribs. He knows the answer, but he asks: “What changed?”

“You walked in.” 

“I could—“

“Hux, for an intelligent person, you are the most stupid sentient lifeform I’ve ever met, you know?”

“I’m beginning to realise that,” Hux admits, over shards of transparisteel in his mouth.

“You came, and I realised I’d just been coasting. Ignoring things... coping.”

“Yeah, well... what do you _want_ in order to be happy, then?”

Kylo plucks at tiny wires with the tweezers, tucking his hair back. “Just having you stay is... good.”

Oh. Okay. Hux feels a stupid drop in his stomach. “I’m afraid your choice in friends is—“

“Hux, would you _please_ stop acting like you’re clueless?”

“I don’t know what you’re—“

Down go the tweezers, slammed, a hand pinning them down. “You’re good company, when you don’t shoot yourself down. Your views on fictional entertainment veer a bit towards the info-doc realism pedantry and less the artistic-aesthetic appreciation, but you’re smart, and funny, and—is it outside of all possibility that I might. Like. _You_?”

“Your pool of—“

Kylo stands up, and Hux nearly falls backwards off the stool as Kylo comes in close, too close. 

The mechanic’s voice is harsh around the edges. “I could have almost anyone, if I wanted it enough. I could walk up into their head, and find everything that made them smile. I could wipe any bad interaction from their mind. I could play them, pull at their heartstrings until they fell in love with me.”

“...that... that wouldn’t be _love_ , Kylo.” Has Kylo done that to him? Had conversations he didn’t like, and hit rewind? How many things should be in his head, and aren’t? 

“Fine, maybe not, but don’t... fine.” He steps back, his fingers going into his hair, his palms covering his eyes. “If you don’t think I’m sincere, then there’s no changing your mind. Not... not and it still be your mind. But fuck’s sake, Hux...”

“And what about when it doesn’t work out? If we – if we tried? What if we give it our best and we end up _hating_ one another? I’ll be kicked out, with a bounty still on my head, and with no contacts left. You could _ruin_ me.”

“You have to decide if it’s worth the risk. _I_ want to try. If you don’t... that’s fine. I won’t punish you for not being interested, but... fuck. Isn’t it worth at least an attempt? I might wind up hating you over something _not_ about – about this. So why not...?”

Hux tangles his ankles around the legs of his stool, the rocking now entirely self-comforting. “I – I don’t know _how_.”

“...neither do I.”

“Kylo, you can’t go around asking people to – to do things, and not know what you’re supposed to do!” He can’t go around suggesting life-changing things without some kind of _plan of attack_.

“Well, so far we’re shouting at one another, and that’s what _my_ parents did, so I assume this is how we start?” Kylo snaps back.

That makes Hux pause. And then – after an awkward moment of realisation – laugh. And laugh. He puts his hands over his face, trying to contain the hysteria, but to no avail.

“What?”

“Kylo... you said yourself, your parents were shitty. Am I now to look through all our fights from back _then_ and assume you were trying to _flirt_ with me?”

“...shut up,” Kylo mutters, his face red. 

“You’re precious.”

“You’re _dead to me_.”

“And there you go again...” Hux smirks as wide as his face can reach. “How about you try to seduce me without arguing with me?”

“So now you _want_ me to seduce you?”

“It might be amusing,” Hux says. “I’ll let you have today to prepare.”

“You’re _scheduling_ seduction?”

“Yep. So you can research.” And him, too. Some habits die hard.  “I expect you to bring your best game.”

“I really... sometimes you can... _okay_ , fine. I’ll—you better not say no right off tomorrow, or I _may_ shoot you somewhere non-terminal.”

“I promise I won’t say no _right_ off.”

“That’ll have to do,” Kylo mutters, and fires up the little soldering iron again. Hux watches, and wonders how he’s supposed to flirt with someone he’s already cohabiting with.


	9. Chapter 9

After a night of barely sleeping, Hux wakes up to a knock on the door. It jolts him upright, and he mutters a garbled ‘come in’, his hand reaching for the blaster by his bedside without really thinking about it.

“...you don’t need to shoot me,” Kylo says, eyes crinkling with amusement. 

“Old habits,” Hux croaks, and pulls his hand back.

The tray of breakfast Kylo has brought in is not quite as lavish as their first breakfast (but also, Hux hadn’t been able to _eat_ all of that). There’s a small bowl of Kylo’s ridiculously coloured cereal, bouncing in the blue milk; a small press of caf; a tall glass of mixed fruit juice. It’s all very civilised, and Hux grins.

“You know, if you try things like this _now_ , I’m not going to be happy if you get complacent later on.”

“Let me worry about that.” Kylo places the tray over his lap, and then steps back. “I’ll let you come around with this. Dress for the outdoors when you’re ready. You mind if we take your ship because it’s smaller?”

“Aren’t you due to be open today?”

“Boss sets the shop hours,” Kylo shrugs. “We’re not struggling for funds. We can take a day out.”

Hux pushes down on the caf, enjoying the rich smell maybe more than he will the taste. “I’m intrigued to see what you have planned.”

“I hope it doesn’t disappoint.”

***

Hux slings his thumbs under his belt (he’s still wearing his blaster, he doesn’t leave without it) watching as Kylo obliviously does the pre-flight checks over his small craft. The man bends down, checking seals and readouts, and Hux is treated to a very nice view.

It hadn’t taken him long as a young man to work out he definitely liked the same sex. He thought maybe he might enjoy the right woman, if she turned up, but he _definitely_ enjoyed the right man. Not that he’d had much chance to experiment, but he’d done enough? He certainly hadn’t felt he’d made the wrong choices over the years. His career had been far more important to him, although maybe he’d have had a happier after-time if he’d...

No point in musing over ‘could have been’s. 

Kylo stands, depriving Hux of that full moon of loveliness, and he has to fight a little flush to his cheeks. “I’m ready.”

“I see that. It would have killed you to clear your throat?”

“Didn’t want to interrupt, or make you bang your head. Anyway, don’t you have Force-senses?”

“Yes, but I don’t... okay. Come on. We’ve got to make the most of this day.”

***

Kylo keeps the navicomp screen covered whenever Hux tries to peek at their destination, much to Hux’s frustration. He likes to know what he’s doing, where, why, and how. It’s not so much control freakery as just liking to be kept informed, okay?

“Hux... has no one ever taken you on a _surprise trip_ before?” Kylo asks, using his foot to wheel Hux’s seat away from the console again.

“No.”

“Not ever?”

“Other than dropping us off in simulated combat scenarios as part of the officer training?”

“...that’s not a trip.”

“Felt like it at the time.”

Kylo lets go of his seat, and Hux half-whirls back, but doesn’t try to look again.

“I just wanted to do nice things for you. Isn’t a surprise nice?”

“In my experience, they haven’t been.” Which – now he thinks about it – is sort of depressing. Surprises normally came in the form of disasters, or other emergencies. No one had ever done nice things for him without expecting his favour or a promotion. 

“...well. I’m not about to do nasty things to you. Do you really need to know where we’re going?”

That’s surprisingly... thoughtful. “I don’t _need_ to know, I suppose, if you assure me it’s going to be enjoyable.”

“As enjoyable as I can make it.”

“Am I at least dressed for the climate?”

“Very much so.”

“And... I don’t need to know anything... weird beforehand?”

“Just to trust me. Or try to, anyway. If it turns out horrible you can always tell me.”

Hux isn’t sure how easily he’d be able to shoot down something Kylo’s clearly worked very hard at, but if it really sucked, maybe he could say something? 

“Hux, I _mean_ it. Give stuff a chance, but if it isn’t working, I’d rather _know_ than worry you were saying you liked it to not hurt my feelings.”

“But what if saying I don’t like it hurts your feelings?”

“Trust me: lying would hurt them more.”

***

Hux isn’t sure what planet Kylo’s brought them to, but it’s a busy one. It’s not Core-sharp, but it’s not shabby or criminal, either. It’s pretty nice, but nothing looks too pricey.

“What... are we here for?”

“Our first date,” Kylo says, and then glances over at him. “If you’re okay with calling it that?”

“...yes?” He’s seen the man before caf, and lives under his roof. He can do one date, right?

“What are your feelings on... animals?”

“Animals.”

“Yes, Hux. Animals.”

“...they... exist? And... we eat some?”

Kylo rolls his eyes. “I’m taking you to a conservationist zoo. You can walk through tunnels and observe them in almost-wild behaviour. They work on supporting species that have low populations, and also some that are just plain cute.”

Hux has literally never been to the zoo. Why would he? Animals were distant parts of food chains and ecological systems. They supplied his plate with protein, and that was it. He’d gone through the same, brief obsession with holos of exotic creatures as anyone had, but...

Oh. He’d forgotten that. There’d been a month or two when he’d been learning the name of every lizard he could find, but then he’d been told it was...

“Was this a bad idea?” Kylo asks, looking concerned.

“No, just... a memory. It’s... it’s okay.”

“Want to talk about it, or... want to just push through?”

“Push through,” Hux says, a little quickly. How had he forgotten that entire period of his life? He’d been _obsessed_ with reptiles. Their scaly hides, their claws, their tongues. He’d known every kind of major order, and how they’d evolved on their respective planets. He’d been utterly enchanted, and then he’d been told it was foolish and he’d somehow _wiped the whole thing from his memory_?

It’s unsettling to think that he could have such big gaps. It’s not even like it was gone for good, it was just put in a box somewhere. When he remembered it, it was like slotting in something, or filling in a gap he’d not known was empty. How many more things does he not remember, and how does he even know...

Later. Existential crisis later. Zoo now. Kylo is looking at him worriedly, and Hux smiles. “It’s okay. I will tell you, but... after?”

“Alright.”

***

Kylo insists on paying for their entrance, and gets them the audio tour. He puts one earbud in, leaving the other empty so they can still talk. Hux does the same thing, and wonders how many adult, middle-age men are here without children. Is it a normal thing for them to be doing?

Does it even matter? Will anyone even look twice at them?

Hux glances around at the other people before he remembers he’s not here to watch _them_. A small girl runs past, holding a floating balloon, and he takes a breath to try to centre himself. _It’s a fucking zoo, Hux. Get a grip_.

Kylo guides him into the first series of tunnels, which walk through a forested canopy. The audio tells him there’s natives of multiple planets here, but that they’ve been long cohabitants after space travel moved their populations around. Weird fluffy things that are all six legs and swinging from branch to branch go about their life ignoring the various species for the most part. Hux wonders if any of the creatures are smart enough to watch _them_ like they watch the ‘captives’?

“That one... has a very interesting, uh...”

Hux watches as the thing sits there, toying with a pouch on its belly, and its nipples. He supposes at least it isn’t outright masturbating, but he turns to Kylo and then they’re both hiding tiny snorts in their hands.

“You know how to seduce a man,” Hux accuses. “Show him horny animals.”

“...okay, I can’t stop them having normal libidos, Hux.”

But it’s broken the ice, and Hux looks to the other side to see the different flowers and trailing vines. One small thing sprawls onto the tunnel above Hux’s head, and he comes into eye-contact with strange, double-eyelidded thing with a tiny nose. For a moment, he’s transfixed.

Then he realises Kylo is staring at him, staring at the thing which stares back, and he flusters. “It was—“

“There’s no need to explain, I _did_ bring you here, after all.”

“Yes, but...” It’s odd. “Didn’t you want to look at the animals, too?”

“And you,” Kylo admits, looking down, then up. “You look so relaxed, for once.”

“Well, they can’t hurt me through the transparisteel.”

“Not everything wants to hurt you,” Kylo reminds him. “Come on, I want to show you the underwater one. And there’s an ice one. And a desert one.”

“Are there... lizards?”

“ _Hundreds_. They’re great. Sometimes they feed them, so if you find that disgusting we can make sure we don’t go then.”

“I’m not sure. Maybe we could try?”

***

Hux likes the zoo. He doesn’t want the animals on him (even though Kylo offers to take him to the part where he can stroke fluffy things and have flapping things stand on his hand. Even though Kylo offers to go in and have them stand on _him_ so it doesn’t look like Hux wants it), but maybe if they come back he’ll be brave enough.

Inside the lizard enclosure, he practically pushes his nose into the tunnel to get close to some of them. The vibrant colours, the twisting body-shapes. Some of them with fronds and frills, some of them able to fly, some of them able to curl into complete balls. Black tongues and multi-faceted eyes. Double-tails. Walking up walls. He remembers the names of many of them, and he points out his favourites to Kylo. 

Kylo likes the ones with weird spikes and bright colours, whilst Hux prefers the ones that fill evolutionary niches. By the end of it, he has a small crowd behind him listening to him sharing facts, and when he notices the small children (and parents) all rapt, he almost chokes up, and then concludes as quickly as he can.

When they’re done, Kylo takes him to the souvenir shop, and Hux rolls his eyes as Kylo buys him a huge, plushie reptile toy. It’s ridiculous, and it takes up a chair at the small table when they sit down for burgers and slushies. (Hux loves it.)

“So... surprises not so bad?”

Hux pushes his fries into neat little lines, and looks up. “Your surprises are – surprisingly – pleasant so far.”

“It’s not over, yet.”

“You plan on taking me on _two_ dates in one day? Won’t you run out of things to do?”

“Considering your appalling history of leisure activities... and I mean that not as a personal attack, but in disgust that no one’s... no one’s taken you to nice places... it will be a while before I run out of things to do with you. If you’re still willing.”

Hux fake-feeds his reptile a fry, then chomps it down. “I’m willing.”

“Then I’m going to take you dancing. If you really want to.”

“...can we at least put this guy on the ship?”

Kylo nods.

***

Dancing. Hux isn’t dressed for dancing. What do you even _wear_ to go dancing? Does it depend on the music? What about when Kylo realises he can’t dance, knows no moves, and has the rhythmic abilities of an AT-AT?

He puts the plushie in the cramped third seat in his cockpit, and fusses his hair in the ‘fresher mirror. Over and over, convinced it’s wrong. Dancing. 

It’s a good way to give them a reason to be close together, but it’s also a potential source of huge embarrassment and social shame. It’s bad enough that Kylo now thinks he was some sort of maintenance-closet-child, without any experience of the world, but he doesn’t want to be publicly shamed.

Kylo is waiting, hopeful, when Hux opens the door. He looks so very, very eager, and Hux watches the eyes slide over him appreciatively. He’s not dressed up nicely, but Kylo seems to like the look of him. 

“I haven’t been dancing in about... thirty years? Longer?” Kylo reassures him. “But no one will care. If you go _with_ someone, people won’t tend to try to make a move, anyway. Usually.”

 _I thought you hadn’t danced_ , comes the uncharitable thought, but maybe Kylo is talking in general, not just dancing. 

“We can be terrible together?” Hux asks.

“Yeah. And if you like, you can do all the date suggestions next time. If you want to, I mean. I like planning them, but I don’t want to steamroller you.”

“You seem to have more ideas about this than I do.” Which is actually a little reassuring. If neither of them had any idea, how poorly would it go? “Very well. You may take me dancing,” Hux proclaims, much to Kylo’s delight.


	10. Chapter 10

Kylo has his hair tied in a loose ponytail behind his head, and he’s otherwise in pretty much smart work clothes. They’ve left their blasters behind (other than the small holdout one Hux won’t give up, and the vibroblade, but those will get past most scanners). Sure, the chances of needing them are slim, but he’ll be grateful of them, if he _does_ need them.

They stand in the short line out front, and Hux feels impossibly old. Young things of either gender push their cleavage or their bottom lips or their lekku out to get noticed and let in, and he’s suddenly worried people will think he and Kylo are lecherous old men. They’re not really ‘old’, but they’re definitely not young either. 

Eventually, they’re let inside. Hux has been in cantinas, of course. He’s been in local watering holes for a drink (but only the odd one or two, because he needed his wits about him), and he’s met in seedy and less-seedy dives to make business arrangements. This is something a bit more up-market, and when Kylo takes him to the bar to order drinks, Hux looks around, taking in the flashing lights and plush booths and the scents and all the coloured bottles that line the wall from floor to ceiling.

“I can fly,” Hux offers.

“I can get us two rooms if we want to drink,” Kylo counters.

“You’re trying to get me drunk?” Hux has to raise his voice a little to be heard over the persistent beat of the bass line. 

“Only if you want to. I thought a few drinks and a nice hotel for a night wouldn’t be too much. We can get adjoining rooms...”

“So you’re not going to try to _really_ seduce me?” Hux sounds scandalised. “Was I not appreciative enough of Mr Bitey?”

“No, I’m just trying to be a gentleman. If you want ravishing...”

The drinks that slide across to them smell so strongly of ethanol that Hux thinks he could get intoxicated from the fumes alone. He’s also pretty sure he can smell _spice_ , which is... never a good thing. “Really?”

“It’s not actually spice,” Kylo reassures him. “It’s artificial flavouring. It’s not allowed on this planet.”

“And you know this because--?”

“I _can_ do my research, you know.”

“You researched our _date_?”

“I had to get it right!”

Hux finds this way more endearing than he should, and he downs the short drink in one. It burns, and warms, and loosens things inside. A toss of the head, and he taps on the bar. “Another.”

He ignores Kylo’s look of surprise, running his tongue around his lips. He’s probably more of a lightweight than he likes to think, but damned if he’ll give up so easily. The man did _research_ , so he’s going to get drunk enough that dancing sounds like a good idea, then – by the Force is he going to _dance_.

***

Two more drinks later and dancing sounds _swell_. He’s watched and there doesn’t seem to be any specific pattern to it, so it’s not like a drill to learn (though that might have been easier), and the music is weirdly infectious, and Kylo is _nervous_ and that’s _cute_.

So cute. So very. Very. Cute.

Deciding it’s time he took the initiative, once Kylo finishes the last drink, Hux grabs his hand and pulls him onto the dancefloor. He tries to ignore how even holding his hand that brief moment is electric, and then he closes his eyes and lets loose for a moment. 

He hasn’t danced in – well – since he was _very_ small, and even then it had been few and far between. He’s sparred when he needed to burn off steam, and he’s slightly worried he’s acting like a spasming lunatic right now. Unable to keep his eyes closed, he sees Kylo watching with – oh _fuck_. He’s love-struck, isn’t he? It’s there in the wrinkle between his eyebrows. The doleful turn of his mouth, as if constantly on the edge of a deep sigh. 

Kylo... really likes him. And it’s probably not just physical if he’s prepared to let him move in and also take him to see _lizards_. Kylo – for some ridiculous reason – knows who Hux is, and he... wants him.

It could just be a puppy-love infatuation. It could blow over once it becomes requited, and the unattainable becomes commonplace. Still, it might be worth it...

Hux sways closer, sucking his lower lip in. Kylo is _pretty_ , even now. Age has just sharpened his already keen features, and the streaks of grey through his temples look like lightning-bolts. His whole body is a temple to efficiency, and those shoulders, that chest, those arms, that ass. Oh, that ass.

But more than that is the _man_. He’d run across the galaxy just to save him, offered him a _home_ , and then researched the hell out of a date just to woo him. He’s funny, and smart, and caring. Oh so very, very caring. How did he miss that, when they were in the Order? Did he not look, or was the shadow of Snoke too overpowering for the flickering light in him to shine out?

Hux drapes his arms over Kylo’s shoulders, splaying his palms over the expanse of his back. He almost shivers when two hands rest on his hips, and then they’re swaying together. Barely touching, really, but they dance closer and closer. Kylo’s chest brushes Hux’s (and does he ever feel inadequately buff now), and the almost electric quality has him moaning.

He wishes he’d kiss him. More than anything, his lips feel the absence of touch, but he won’t break this wonderful tension. Their eyes lock, and Hux forgets everyone else in the room. He doesn’t care who sees them dancing together, doesn’t care if there’s a bounty on their heads, or senators and generals with kill-on-sight orders, if they even knew they weren’t already dead. 

There is no war. No fallen Order. No Snoke, no Knights, no regulations and no history. It’s just this man who – for reasons Hux can’t entirely fathom – wants to dance with him. He slides a thumb under the soft knot of his hair, brushing the back of Kylo’s neck. It causes a ripple through him, and the hands on his waist move to his upper thighs, pulling Hux into his chest.

Still unable to speak, Hux lets himself be tugged in, and there’s a sudden expanse of warmth against his whole core. He drops his head onto Kylo’s shoulder – face turned away – as those fingers slide around, edging towards his ass. He wants to feel them there, and he encourages it with the lightest of presses of his lips to Kylo’s shoulder. 

Finally, there’s two hands cupping his buttocks. It sends a spike of enjoyment through him, despite all the alcohol, and he wonders if Kylo can feel it? He keeps up the soft mouthing of his neck, turning his face up to trail the soft kisses to just behind Kylo’s ear.

“Want to find that hotel?” Kylo asks.

“You mean you didn’t already make reservations?”

“I did, but they’re provisional.”

Hux slides his fingers up into Kylo’s tied hair, dragging his mouth to the corner of his. “Aren’t you at least going to kiss me before you take me home?”

Maybe he should feel bad about grinding up against him in public, but Hux is sure everyone here has seen worse than two battle-scarred soldiers dancing badly and sucking face. He slides his lips across Kylo’s, first, to test the water. The moan he gets is worth it, and he holds him still as he goes back the other way, pausing when their noses are softly bumping. He hasn’t kissed in a long time, and he doesn’t know if Kylo has kissed much, but it doesn’t really matter: you look stupid, and if you’re not into it, it’s awful. If you _are_ , it’s great.

Hux is very much into it. He tugs and plucks at Kylo’s lips, then uses just the smallest amount of tongue. He’s not much for the sloppy style, but at the rakish stroke over his own, he finds Kylo to be more than adequate in that department.

“Room?” Hux asks, hoarsely. He’s hard as fucking nails and has to walk out of here like that. Everyone’s going to know they’re off to – to – if Kylo wants it, that is.

“Room.”

***

True to his word, Kylo’s got them a lovely room. It does have two adjoining, meaning he’s been more than prepared for Hux to chicken out, or even retreat if needed. He appreciates the concession, and that makes it easier to go ahead. 

He’s pretty sure if he wanted to cool off at any point that Kylo would just grab a cold shower and let him. More than pretty sure. They kept hip-checking and hand-holding all the way back, to the point where Hux was worried the skycar driver would tell them to stop, and he’d nearly giggled in embarrassment. 

Yep. He was head over heels, too. He’d been trying to ignore it because it would make things ‘awkward’, but maybe Kylo had been doing the same thing? Whatever. Now they didn’t have to, and Hux was frankly terrified and turned on in equal measure, which was _clearly_ the foundation of a _beautiful_ relationship.

The room is huge. Or – by Hux’s standards. There’s a small couch and a holoscreen, a tiny little mini-kitchen thing, a big suite with tub _and_ shower, and the biggest bed Hux remembers ever seeing.

“Can you afford this?”

“Hux... I’m not struggling for money. I use the Force to fix things. People _like_ fixed things. Things break a lot, too.”

“Except when you fix them.”

“Well, they still break, but they go for longer between.”

Now they’re here, Hux is nervous again. You only really get one shot at your first time with someone, and the pre-moments are... special. After, it’s happened. Before, everything is still possible. He tells himself it’s this, and not performance anxiety, but when Kylo sits on the edge of the bed and reaches for his wrist, he bites his lip, hard.

“We don’t have to do anything,” Kylo points out. “We could even just... kiss and cuddle, if that’s what you want.”

Because what hot-blooded male has ever been satisfied with that? He’ll disappoint him. His sex-drive won’t be adequate. His dick will be too small, he’ll—

“Stop over-thinking it,” Kylo pleads. “I just want you happy. You don’t need to worry about me.”

“And what if I want to make you happy?”

“You do that by _being_ happy.”

“I can’t just be happy to make you happy!”

“...why not?” The Knight’s head tilts. 

“I can’t just be happy on command!”

“...can you be happy I’m happy?”

“...yes?”

“Then I’m happy,” Kylo says, and pulls at his wrist, hard enough to make Hux wobble.

He wobbles right into Kylo’s arms, where he sighs, and sits sideways across his lap. “You’re incorrigible.”

“Then don’t try to correct me,” Kylo replies, nosing at his neck. 

Hux drapes one arm around Kylo’s shoulders, the other plucking at his chin to demand real kisses. Kylo resists for a while, then lets his face be turned. Without the thrumming music, he can hear the raspy breaths and the rustle of clothing. Hux slides his hand lower, going to unbutton the shirt that keeps that magnificent chest caged. Such a body should be free, and he snicks buttons free from their mooring. 

Kylo has a hand on his ass again, kneading his buttock through the heavy-duty pants he’s wearing. He doesn’t own anything he couldn’t run and fight in, which maybe he should expand to a _few_ casu—

Hux yelps, and leaps back, slapping at Kylo’s other hand.

“What?”

“You just nearly got shot!” Hux points out. “Let me...”

“Hux, did your clothing try to _murder me_?”

“You snuck up on it,” he replies with a sigh. “Maybe you should also disarm.”

“I didn’t take an arsenal to a _dance club._ ”

“That was remiss of you, then.”

“...you regularly need a blaster in a dance club?”

Hux slams the holdout weapon, and then the vibroblade, down onto the bedside cabinet. “No, but there’s a first time for everything.”

“You’re lucky I—“ Kylo stops. “At least you didn’t _actually_ shoot me.”

“We’re not very good at this, are we?” He asks with no small amount of wry amusement, as he moves to kneel over Kylo’s lap. “Any minute now, one of us will accidentally start a war.”

“I hope not. I’ve had enough of those for a lifetime... can we just be... us?”

Hux still isn’t entirely sure who ‘he’ is, but maybe he just has to decide that, or make it. He knows things he likes, and those things include (to his surprise): dancing with Kylo, zoos, kissing, and having a home. He likes watching holos, and cooking, and buying large quantities of firearms and getting to test them. He likes... this life. 

There’s just one thing missing, and that’s whatever he can do to repay Kylo. He’s absolutely certain Kylo wouldn’t demand sexual privileges as repayment, and probably would feel disgusted if it was offered as a reckoning. He’s never been anything but a slightly moody gentleman, after all. 

Hmm. He’s going to need to think about that, but not right now. Now, he’s back to unfastening Kylo’s shirt, slipping the layers of fabric away from his ribs. Hands slide over his thighs as he does so, and he bites his lip at the toned, sculpted beauty in front of him. Age has done little but whittle the man away to perfection, and Hux can’t help but hiss in appreciation.

“What?”

“Just... you’re beautiful,” Hux says, sheepishly. 

“Oh shut up,” Kylo says, turning his head away, flushing rather adorably.

“No, I mean it. You’re gorgeous.” Hux dances his fingers over his collarbones, the slight just of skeleton through flesh. So close to death, so close to life. He whispers his fingertips down over the expanse of his chest, his thumbs pinching up to pull at the pink nubs of his nipples, listening to the little gasps.

“H-how do you... I mean...” Kylo’s hands on his ass grip tighter, pulling the man down onto his thighs. 

“You mean, how do we... work out what we’re going to do?”

Kylo nods. “Uh. I hadn’t really worked out this far.”

“You rented a double suite and didn’t think to ask me if I liked to top or bottom?”

“...no?”

Hux snorts, and shoves a hand between Kylo’s legs. “I like all sorts of things, so long as both parties are willing, and no one ends up maimed. You can relax. I’m not picky.”

Kylo’s eyes are glossy as Hux teases at his groin, feeling for the thickening swell of his cock. It’s been a while, so maybe he shouldn’t try to leap onto it, or give his to Kylo. His eyes are bigger than his butthole, after all, and he’ll be sore if he drunkenly takes a dick he can’t handle. 

“How about we start with hands?” Hux asks, and sits back enough to unfasten Kylo’s belt and pants, leaving the straining shaft wrapped in soft cotton. 

“Uh...” 

“Relax,” Hux tells him, and uses one finger to trail around the outline, not touching him, but pulling the boxers tighter. “If we enjoy this enough, there’s all the time in the galaxy for everything else. I’d like to work out what sort of things you enjoy, to start off with.”

“I... y-yes...”

Why is his mumbling so hot? Hux fusses a loose curl of hair back behind Kylo’s ear, then hooks a finger under his waistband. “Want to watch your face. See what you like. Tell me if it’s too fast, too slow, too hard...”

Kylo’s hand shoots up, grabbing the back of his head. Hux likes the sharp sting as Kylo holds onto his slightly long hair (he’s due a cut, but maybe he won’t if Kylo can use it like that), and his other hand moves to stroke over the front of his groin. “Want to do the same for you.”

“Please,” Hux purrs. “I’d love it.”

He waits for a moment as Kylo unfastens his own pants, pulling carefully, easing his cock out of his clothing. They’re not even naked, but this is hotter than it has any right to be. Hux looks down to admire Kylo’s dick, nestled in salt-and-pepper hair, saluting him with no shame. Kylo’s _very_ well proportioned, and Hux wonders if he’d even be able to fit it in his mouth, let alone his ass, but that won’t stop him trying.

“You’re beautiful, you know?” Kylo manages to say, regaining partial control of his tongue. “So beautiful.”

Hux doesn’t feel it, but the sudden heat and... something else... that look in Kylo’s eyes, the way his lower lip moves like the ocean... he can believe the man thinks it. Oddly, it sends a crushing weight on his chest like a Bantha sat on him, and he has to lean in to kiss him.

The cock in his hand feels so good to stroke, after years of only touching himself. He pulls whimpering sounds from the other end of the man, and their kiss becomes as heated as the twisting, tugging motions. Kylo gives as good as he gets, his nails a little scratchy when he drags them, too, and then there’s a weird rubbing, rolling pressure over the crown and down over the sides of the tip. Hux thrusts awkwardly, and then shoves Kylo onto his back. 

The kiss broken, Hux slaps Kylo’s hand away, and then lines their cocks up against one another. He can’t help but critically compare their girth and length for a moment, but then he uses his thumb to hold his still, his fingers wrapped around Kylo’s cock as he starts to thrust against it, making their flesh stroke one another.

“ _Maker_ ,” Kylo whimpers. “Oh shit, oh fuck...”

“You’re _gorgeous_ ,” Hux enthuses, humping his grip and the other man’s cock in one, feeling the skin tug back and the throb of his pulse. He grinds fiercely, enjoying the mutual pleasure more than the touches themselves.

When Kylo surges, rolling them over and dropping Hux below him, he doesn’t fight it. He doesn’t fight when his hands are grabbed and pushed to the bed, but he complains with a squawk when Kylo retreats.

Well, until the man is pinning his hands by his hips and kneeling between his parted thighs to kiss at his belly, and move his lips down towards his groin. The struggle for dominance is delicious, and although Kylo could easily use brute force – or brute _Force_ – Hux knows he wouldn’t outright control him unless he wanted it. The threat is there, and that’s just as hot.

Hux tries to pull his hands free, but then there’s a nose stroking over his cock, pushing it more central, tiny little outhuffs of breath over the sensitive skin.

“Oh _fuck_ ,” Hux can’t help but say.

Kylo’s full lips have hold of his balls, and his tongue laps wetly at the flesh in his soft grip. It’s enough to make him try to thrust, but there’s nothing to push his dick into, not yet. His eyes jam shut at the delicious wetness, and then there’s a flat tongue licking him from root to tip. 

It really isn’t fair. That tongue licks him over and over, and Hux wants to grab his ears, his hair, and force his mouth to work properly. He pulls with his hands, hungry and desperate, and when those lips seal around the flare of his cock he nearly lifts off the bed.

Oh, it’s been too long since someone sucked him off. He’d forgotten how nice it feels, and the firm tongue that pushes his shaft up into the roof of his mouth is just... Hux wants to beg, but he won’t. Not yet. His chest heaves hard, and he feels Kylo struggle to take him deeper in.

“Gnnnh,” Hux says, trying to sound encouraging. Kylo sucks like a man who also hasn’t done it in a while, with less technique than might be expected, but more depth than Hux could have hoped for. There’s a slight gag when he hits the back, then Kylo starts to move in earnest.

Yep. Definitely been too long. Hux is going to come in moments like this, and he fights for his hands to get Kylo to stop. He doesn’t want to embarrass himself by coming too soon, but Kylo won’t let go and Hux yelps.

“Ky! I’m – I’m g-nnn _ggghhh_ —“

Kylo sucks harder, holding Hux’s wrists down so he can’t fight him off. His head bobs furiously over his lap, and then he looks up at Hux right as he pulls up to suckle fiercely over the tip. The longing, loving look is more than Hux can handle, and he squeaks an undignified happy sound as his climax hits like a wave long-coming.

The man tries to swallow, but Hux can see he’s struggling a bit, and when he lets go of his prick he’s licking and slurping his mouth clean.

“Kylo...”

“Sorry. Been a while,” he admits, and lets go of Hux’s hands.

Hux is feeling a little dazed and half-way on another plane, the sudden shock of his orgasm making his body floaty and happy. But Kylo hasn’t had his, and Hux wants him to.

“How... would you like to finish?” he asks. “My hand? My mouth?” He reaches to stroke at his hair, his body melting softly into the bed. 

“Your hand?” Kylo asks, slowly climbing up the bed, putting his head on the pillow, turned slightly to face him. “As I sort of bulldozed your idea.”

“I enjoyed it,” Hux reassures him, putting one hand under the pillow and turning to face him. 

Their noses close, he watches Kylo’s face as he reaches to take his cock in his grip. He keeps looking down at those warm lips, remembering the feel of them, wanting to taste. He’s not sure if he’ll like the taste of his own semen, but maybe...

“Kiss me?” Hux asks, as he starts to pump Kylo’s dick harder. 

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

Hux closes his eyes, feeling the supple lips against his own. He licks across them, tasting the faintest smudges of salt, and then his head is held in place as Kylo starts to hump into his fist. It’s messy, and sticky, and wonderful. There’s a moment where Kylo’s mouth opens wider and Hux _plunders_ his tongue, stroking hard as he feels the shuddering release splash over his fingers. He keeps on working, tugging every last shoot out of him, gliding his thumb over the head and feeling the whimpers into his mouth.

When Kylo finally stops, he doesn’t let go of his cock, but he does still his hand. The kiss breaks, and Kylo’s kiss-stained mouth is lightly parted, his long lashes drawing back from his cheeks to gaze over at him.

“Don’t leave,” Kylo begs him.

“I won’t,” Hux promises.

“I – I don’t mean _now_ , I mean—“

Ever. Hux knows. Kylo means forever. Stay with me. Not in this room, but in his arms. “I know,” Hux replies. “I won’t.” 

He slips a leg over Kylo’s, pulls him close, and settles in against him. Their foreheads touch, and Hux feels so very, very safe. And so very, very nervous, but it’s a good nervous. A happy one. It’s a long time before they fall asleep, although Hux isn’t sure if he keeps drifting in and out on a drunken, loved wave.


	11. Chapter 11

In the morning, Hux wakes with only a mild headache, and one that he’s sure a lot of liquids and some analgesics will cut through in no time. It’s his own fault for not hydrating himself enough after drinking excessive amounts of alcohol. 

He’s got his face pushed up against Kylo’s, an arm over his waist, and he doesn’t remember the last time he actually fell _asleep_ with someone this close. Even in the Academy, his one night stands had slunk back to their bunks after, or he’d done. 

There’s something weirdly more intimate than the touching of a penis to waking up like this, seeing Kylo’s eyes move under his closed lids, hearing the snuffle between breaths and feeling his sides move with his breath. Kylo looks so utterly peaceful that it would be a shame to wake him, even though Hux’s mouth is dry.

What he wouldn’t give for the Force. 

Hux decides to let his mind drift, and he goes through the various stages of barely-awake, with his thoughts sometimes jumbling with other things (he looks so pretty with the light-is this sheet silk-used to like the green best) in no coherent order. In and out of consciousness, humming with satisfaction.

He is – sort of? – dating Kylo. They went out on a date and then a second one in the same day, and then they ended up fucking madly in a hotel room. And he lives with him. And this means he can have sex with him (should Kylo still be willing) whenever and wherever he wants. And breakfasts. And holos. And everything.

He’s... he’s normal? Like normal people? If there’s such a thing as it. Hux rubs a hand over his eyes, pushing until he sees lights, and then shoves his nose into Kylo’s neck to breathe him in.

Normal.

***

When Kylo wakes him up, Hux grunts sleepily. He’s not tired, but he enjoys staying asleep.

“C’mon, we need to check out.”

“Huh?”

“Unless you want to book for another night, we need to check out.”

“Oh.” Okay. He looks at the chrono and realises they both slept through most of the morning. Whoops. He rubs at the corners of his eyes, yawning. “Okay. Give me a few.”

“I’ll pack up ready to check out, you can have the ‘fresher first.”

“Okay.” He’s still not sure he’s awake enough for that, but he can get a glass of water if he does, so reluctantly he climbs out of bed.

***

Kylo is quiet as they get to the ship, and he taps in the jump calculations, putting Hux’s small ship into hyperspace. He’s so quiet that Hux worries, and bites his lip, waiting to see if he’s now regretting the night before.

Has he decided Hux isn’t worth the effort, that the payout was inadequate for his investment? Or does he have buyer’s remorse? 

Hux opts to keep quiet, knowing until they’re back and Kylo is free to leave the ship and isn’t dependent upon his wings to get anywhere that he’ll be—

Okay, so he _tried_. “Did I do something wrong?” he asks, not looking at Kylo when he asks.

“No, why would you think you did?”

“You’ve been quiet all morning. Look, if you want me to leave, I’ll—“

“Did I say I wanted you to leave?”

Hux wheels on him. “No, but you haven’t really made a good case for you wanting me to stay.”

“I’ve not done anything to say I want... Hux, look... I’m sorry.”

“Why? Sorry you had sex with me?”

“I’m sorry I got you drunk and then took advantage of you!” Kylo blurts out. “That’s all!”

“Like I wouldn’t consent sober, you mean?”

“Well you hadn’t so far, and it was irresponsible of me to—“

“I didn’t know you _wanted_ to before!”

“I wasn’t exactly subtle, Hux.” Kylo’s eyes narrow. “But you’re right, sure, whatever.”

“Why are you angry? It can only be because you did it and you regret it.”

“Hux... I’m angry with _myself_ that I took some of your inhibitions away and then pushed you into it. It was... it was wrong of me.”

“I’m a fully grown adult, and I went into that club knowing you were interested in me, and I drank alcohol knowing you were interested in me, and I came to this hotel... you get the picture. If I wasn’t interested, do you think I would even have let you take me on the first date, let alone out dancing?”

Hux watches as cogs whirl in Kylo’s mind. It’s almost comical to observe, and he has to bite the inside of his mouth to keep the laughter inside.

“...so you... you... aren’t mad at me?” Kylo asks.

“Why would I be... _no_ , Kylo. I’m mad you seem to not take my consent as rigorous and explicit, but if it helps you to hear it from me now: yes. Yes, I was happy last night. Yes, I went into it with my faculties intact. No, I don’t regret it. Yes, I would do it again... if you wanted to, also.”

Hux is actually surprised with himself for saying it, for coming out and... yes. Agreeing. But he knows the minute the words slip out that it’s true. For better or worse, he wants this to continue. It’s added yet more happiness to an already much happier life, and although there’s problems even the morning _after_ , those problems aren’t more discomfort than the happiness he’s enjoying.

“Okay.” Kylo’s hand reaches just slightly sideways, his fingers brushing Hux’s. “I just didn’t want you to think... I just wanted to know I wasn’t...”

“It’s okay,” Hux reassures him. “I know I’m uptight, and high-strung, and high-maintenance. But you’re not pushing me, or coercing me. I mean, yes you’re pushing me, but it’s not against my wishes, it’s through my own... stubborn self-defeating.”

“Hard to be sure, when you’ve got the Force,” Kylo replies, looking away.

“You’re not bullying me into sex, Kylo. I _promise_ you I’m happy.”

“Okay.” He turns back, then, and he looks like he’s on the verge of tears.

Does he often feel like he’s pushing his will on others? Hux had never even considered the man would ever use the Force like that. Not in a personal relationship, anyway. How different must Kylo’s whole life must have been utterly different from Hux’s since the first day...

He stands, and walks over to him, pushing his arms aside and settling down on one knee. He puts his arms around Kylo’s neck, making his choices _clear_ and bold. “Kylo, listen to me. You couldn’t make me do what I didn’t want with a few drinks. You are a kind and caring soul, and you deserve someone so much better for you than I am.”

“I’m not kind, Hux. You know how many people I’ve killed.”

“Blow up five planets and we’ll talk about who is more evil.”

“...that... you thought you were doing what you needed to, for...”

“On some level, yes, but I also knew I was destroying civilian lives, and more than I needed to. _Plus_ , we didn’t even win the war.”

Kylo’s head pushes into Hux’s neck, and Hux strokes through his hair. 

“I’m not a good person, Hux. Even if I’m nice to you, that doesn’t make me a good person. A good person is nice to everyone, not just the people they like, or want things from.”

“Maybe so, and if that’s true, then we’re both pretty horrible,” Hux agrees, “...but you... you knew the Starkiller was wrong.”

“I still let you build and fire it.”

“Okay. Yes.”

“I knew it was wrong, and I didn’t stop it. You didn’t know how bad it was – not like I did – so you don’t have the same—“

“Kylo,” he says, putting a finger over his lips. “Stop. I did know, and I did it. And I live with myself, knowing I did it. And if I was back in that situation again... I guess I’d fire it again, or run away, knowing we would lose. I don’t know.”

“You would?”

“If I knew we’d lose the war... I suppose I wouldn’t. If I went and told past me we would lose, he would still do it. He was... he was fanatical. He hadn’t seen the worst of the Order, back then. He’d think it was still worth the risk.”

“But you, now?”

“Now, I just... now I see the galaxy wouldn’t be much more controlled under the Order. It’s too big, too sprawling, to ever really be organised. You _can’t_ make so many different planets, and cultures, and species, and people fall into one, organised whole...”

“You know I joined because of the Force?” Kylo asks.

“I had the slightest suspicion, yes,” Hux agrees, with a soft smile. “You weren’t one for ordering and organising chaos.”

“I couldn’t live with just the Light, and he... he turned me away from my family. If I had my chances, all over, I would have never had the Force at all. I don’t agree with either side, not fully.”

“So you’d live like you are, now?”

“I can’t be the meditative Light, and the destructive Dark... is the way to death and mayhem. If they wouldn’t let me find this middle ground, then I would run away and find it myself,” he agrees. “If I could keep him out of my head.”

“Snoke?”

Kylo nods.

“He was there... and it’s only since he died that...”

“That I became free,” Kylo agrees. “So I guess I needed my family to stop him, but after that...”

It’s tragic, in a way. Kylo is so much happier away from galactic politics, and he’s sure the only reason the young man had ever been part of it was his birth-family. He could have been born to anyone else and he wouldn’t have had the same life at all.

Well, neither would Hux, but Brendol had harboured different ideas about his son.

“So I’m no better,” Kylo pushes. “Don’t think that I am.”

“We both did terrible things,” Hux agrees. “And I... do feel bad about what I did, but... I guess not bad enough.” And he feels bad that he doesn’t feel worse. It’s complicated, but how do you truly ever feel regret enough for that amount of loss of life?

Can you? Can you even approach the depth of emotion you’d need to feel?

“...where do we go from here?” Kylo asks.

“Depends where you want to go,” Hux replies. “I’m a terrible person, and it appears I’m in—I... uh. And...”

“Me too,” Kylo says, very quietly.

Hux hadn’t even said it, but he knows Kylo knows what he was about to say. “I like... living with you. And you’re not terrible at dates. And we’re both mass-murdering assholes.”

“...that’s really not a good way to sell this, you know?” Kylo asks.

“I’m sorry, but who I am is part of what a relationship with me is.” Hux closes his eyes. “It’s who I am. It’s who you’d be dating. I am what I did.”

“It’s part of you.”

“Yes, but you also have to know...” What? He did those things. He still hasn’t even come to terms with what that _means_ , so how can he expect to... “Kylo, don’t you get it?”

“Obviously not?”

Hux closes his eyes. He hasn’t worked all of this out himself, yet. “Letting... letting you in means I have to... I have to come to terms with things. Face things. I have to... I have to...”

“Like yourself?” Kylo says, very softly. “You have to agree that you can _be_ loved, before you accept someone actually does love you?”

Damnit, yes. His hands tighten, his jaw feels like it’s going to break. “I spent so long running because I didn’t want to have the time and space to think about my past. It was easier that way.”

“I’ve done things, too,” Kylo points out. “Does it mean just because we did things that we regret, that we can’t find love now?”

“What if I don’t regret them enough?” Hux asks, and his eyes open again. “How can I ever regret them enough?”

“I don’t think there’s a sliding scale of regret, Hux. I think you feel it, or you don’t.”

Quite despite himself – and for no reason he can really quantify properly – Hux starts to cry. He hasn’t cried – not _seriously_ – not in years. But it all hits him, with Kylo’s arms around him, and happiness on the horizon. It hits him, because he doesn’t think he _deserves_ that happiness, and he’s not sure how he _can_ deserve it, and he just wants the world to swallow him up and destroy him, except he also wants to _live_ , and he doesn’t know how to make the two make sense.

_I killed them I killed them I did it it was me I killed them all those people I did it I can’t I can’t I—_

He feels arms – big, strong, warm – hold and rub him, and he cries even harder. 

“Th-this is... who you love,” he stammers out, snotty and self-loathing. “This is who I am.”

“I know,” Kylo says, and strokes him all the harder. He’s not crying, but he can feel the shudders in his body. “I  know who you are, and I love you even so.”

Hux does not deserve it, and he cries until he’s almost unconscious in Kylo’s arms.


	12. Chapter 12

When they get back ‘home’, Hux is ashamed of himself. He’s not cried – not really – in years. Not since he was a callow youth, and he can hardly count himself that, now. But he’d cried himself empty on Kylo’s shoulder, and Kylo had just rubbed his back and his hair and told him it was okay.

It wasn’t okay. It wasn’t. Hux knew – knows – precisely what he did. He knows how many lives he took (he made them give him the official figure, once the dust settled over the once-Hosnian-system). He knows, and he’s still not wholly sure anyone could ever feel regret for that amount of loss of life.

Can you? Can you understand that one command – ‘Fire!’ – could kill billions? There were so many people that Hux would have had to meet one hundred million people a day, every day, for a standard year to meet them all. Eight million an hour, on each of those days, assuming a twelve-hour shift. That was how many people he had killed.

Just. Like that.

 _Fire_.

Even Kylo hadn’t killed as many, though admittedly his killing had usually been more personal. An assassin, not a war criminal. 

How can you begin to comprehend that level of destruction? It isn’t even a real number. It’s just... insane. Hux can’t possibly atone for that level of killing, and even if he tries to off-set it by the Resistance’s destruction of the Starkiller... he can’t. They evacuated a huge number of personnel, and that was a retaliatory strike. It was preventing further loss of life (their own) and he...

There’s no way to come to terms with it. He’s a monster, as real as any monster can be. Maybe Kylo thinks his own killings were worse, because they were personal, but Hux... 

“How can I make it right?” he asks, as Kylo puts him on the tall stool, wrapping a blanket around him.

Kylo forgot to set the heating to work without their physical presence, probably because he’s forgotten and left it on when he’s been away before, so the room is a bit cooler than it should be. 

“You mean, Starkiller?”

“...do... do I need to hand myself in?”

Kylo pauses. “No.”

“But surely I should—“

“What would you do? You’d be arrested, and held prisoner.”

“Don’t you think I deserve that?”

“Everyone already thinks you’re dead. If you came back to life, you’d rob those people of their peace. Those who lost people... and why? So you could live in a jail cell? You’d never be able to be released. You could never redeem enough for the galaxy to be happy with you at large. You don’t have any intelligence to barter with any more, and you’d just be a financial drain on others to keep you housed. Not to mention you’d be in solitary to keep you from assassination attempts...”

“So I shouldn’t hand myself over because of a _financial inconvenience_?”

“Hux, what good would you going to jail serve you, or the community?”

“I don’t know, maybe I could live with myself?” He doesn’t _want_ to go to jail, but if it’s the only way to put to rest all those voices, perhaps he should.

“If you want to make reparations... why don’t we do something that _helps_ , instead of go around punishing you for something you did years ago? You’re not—“

“I’m not... what? Committing more mass-murders?” He isn’t. He wouldn’t. Not now, anyway. “So if it’s a financial burden, we don’t lock people up?”

“I’m just saying... there’s... what you did was in war.”

“Those are commonly referred to as ‘war crimes’, Kylo. The clue is in the term. I can spell it out for you if you’d like?”

“Hux, would you stop being facetious? You aren’t doing it anymore; you run the very real risk of making lots of people unhappy you are alive, and unsettling any peace they came to; you’re not going to change because you already _wouldn’t_ do it again; and – I don’t want you to!”

It’s a bit hypocritical, avoiding the rule of law, just because it’s convenient. Though Hux has only ever followed rules he could believe in, if he’s entirely honest with himself, this just seems like too much of a ‘get out of jail free’ card, quite literally.

Hux pulls the blanket tighter around himself, accepting the offering of caf into his fluffy den.  “I just... don’t think I can go around making rules up for myself.”

“Do you really, truly regret it?”

“I don’t... know. Sometimes I do, sometimes I can’t think about it. It’s too big.”

“Would you feel better about it if you were in prison?”

“...I don’t know. I guess I’d feel miserable, but I deserve to?”

“Does that bring people back?”

“Kylo, how can I possibly count myself any differently to other people?”

“Fine: go, hand yourself in. Get locked up. Get murdered in prison.”

For the love of... “Why are you being like this?”

“Because for once in your miserable life you have the chance to be _free_ from everything – everything everyone wanted of you! You have the chance at happiness, and you think you aren’t owed it. You’d rather be _miserable_ than be with me.”

“That... that is not... Ky, all those people? They don’t even get to be miserable.”

“So make people happy.”

“What?”

“If you’re serious about this, about... making amends... find some way to make other people happy.”

“By... shooting them? Because that’s my marketable skill.”

Kylo slumps into his own stool, his hands working one over the other. “We’ve got enough money to support us both, if only I work.”

“So... what are you suggesting?”

“You want to repay that favour you owe me?”

Always. _Always_. Hux nods, his mouth a little dry.

“I earn our living, and you... repair some of the damage we did to the galaxy. I don’t care if you teach kids how to count, or you donate tins of soup, or you drive an emergency ambulance... you find something, and you can repair some of the damage we did.”

“I blew up five planets, Kylo.”

“So did everyone who worked in the Order,” Kylo reminds him. “So you can divide that responsibility down a little. And you were following orders.”

“That doesn’t mean me doing it was right!”

“No, it doesn’t. But... look. What would Snoke have done to you, if you refused?”

Probably had him shot for insubordination, or reconditioned, Hux thinks. “I still did it.”

“You did, but I’m saying... there were some mitigating factors, and maybe you could help by flying cargo for homeless shelters, or... I don’t know. I’m sure you could do some good. Some _real_ good, that you could never do if you were locked up.”

“Is that just us being selfish?”

“Maybe it is, but... I really don’t think your conscience would be best served behind bars, Hux. If you can’t live with yourself if you don’t, then I can’t stop you, but...”

He just wants the pain to go away. “Can we think about this tomorrow?”

Kylo nods. “Yes. Please.”

***

That night, Hux is tired from looking up charitable works. He’s still not sure they’ll take him. Won’t they vet people, to make sure they aren’t out to rob them blind? Or to cause pain and suffering to already vulnerable people?

He rules out anything with children for two reasons. One: the safeguarding systems will likely be too robust, and his ident won’t hold up to that level of scrutiny. Two: he isn’t really that fond of children. He is fine with them existing, but somewhere he isn’t, preferably.

There are some promising other things he could help with. He doesn’t want anything where he makes decisions for people, but he can definitely loan his hands, his strength, his eyes, his reflexes, and his wits. Hux isn’t sure it would even begin to repay his ‘debt’ to society, but even wiping some of his transgressions clean must be better than doing nothing whatsoever, right?

Kylo closes up the shop, and Hux shuffles around with the blanket still in place. He’s gotten used to it, and he thinks removing it will leave him way, way too cold. He waddles up the stairs, and then pauses at the top.

How attractive must he look, wrapped up like a sandwich, his face and fingers the only things showing? He grins down at Kylo, who has moony eyes for him.

“What?” Kylo asks.

“You have ridiculous taste.”

“Go warm the bed up with your hot air,” Kylo calls back.

That answers that question.

***

Without the social lubricant of alcohol, Hux is more self-conscious this time. He changes into his pyjamas, brushes his teeth, and climbs into Kylo’s bed. He’s pretty sure he’s wanted, there. 

He’s tired, but not exhausted, but his eyes still stay closed more than open as he waits for his – boyfriend? – boyfriend – to join him. He drifts softly off, and it isn’t until the bed dips that he realises he fell asleep waiting for him, waking with a jolt like he’s been shocked.

Which is about as embarrassing as it gets. It had just been so warm and fluffy, and he’d been so very comfortable and safe. He blinks owlishly at the other man, trying to look like the closed eyes had been a deliberate choice, not an accidental exhaustion.

“You want to just sleep?” Kylo asks.

“...no! I was... I was resting my eyes.”

“And your nose.”

Shit. He’d been snoring, hadn’t he? Hux flushes with shame, and even when there’s a flurry of kisses to the side of his neck, he just goes redder still. “Okay, I’m awake, I promise,” he says, as Kylo kisses up along his hairline.

“Sure I wasn’t interrupting? We could just cuddle...”

Like hell will they just cuddle, Hux huffs. Kylo grabs his hands, pushing them into the pillow on either side of his face, waking him up still further.

Hux struggles to focus past the too-near-nose, rolling his eyes at the presumption. “Cuddling after. You’re not getting out of that.”

“You sure you’re—oof!”

Hux knows how to fight dirty. An elbow here, a pinch there, and he rolls them over so he’s straddling Kylo’s waist, slipping his hands free. “Am I sure of what?”

“That you’re up for this?”

“I am old, I am not _dead_.”

“Dead men don’t snore,” Kylo agrees.

Hux growls a warning, and then bends to kiss him on the lips. It’s a steady kiss, and one that slides lip to lip without a hint of a tongue for long moments. The kind of kiss you’re always sure you want, and don’t always know how to get. Hux feels things move about inside as they embrace, and then he’s breaking the lip-lock for air.

“Dead men don’t kiss like that, either,” Kylo adds. 

“I haven’t... in a while,” Hux admits. “Kissing, or the other stuff.”

“Yeah. First in a long time for me, too,” Kylo admits.

“Now would be the time to confirm any real preference.”

“I prefer to enjoy myself, and to make _sure_ my partner does. Other than that...”

Perfect. Hux understands some people have set roles, but he never liked the idea of limiting himself, even if his dating pool was zero for the majority of his life. He sits back on his haunches, a hand opening up Kylo’s pants, even as Kylo crosses over to do the same for him. 

Without the alcohol, and with just sleepiness, it feels a lot... closer? Hux isn’t able to properly put a finger on it, but ‘closeness’ is as close (no pun intended) as it gets. 

He shrugs off his shirt with his other hand, and unbuttons Kylo’s to help him undress, too. Which is when it hits him: he’s in Kylo’s bed, and he’s about to be naked. Worse, or better, he _wants_ to be. Clothing hits the wall almost vehemently as they roll left and right to divest one another, and then they’re tumbled under the covers, fingers in hair, eyes following one another. 

This is serious. _They_ are serious. 

“You okay?” Kylo asks.

“Yeah.” Hux feels a little choked. “More than.” 


	13. Chapter 13

Hux feels a little sheepish getting naked, but he also feels pretty damn good about it. The sheets cover them both, and it’s... okay, so the last few times have been cheap hook-ups. He’s never outright paid for sex, but he’s definitely plied people with drinks, with the unspoken agreement being what they’d be used for. He didn’t feel bad at the time, but it does mean he hasn’t got much experience of the ‘in a relationship’ sex.

The feel of worn, soft cotton over his waist and calves as he kisses Kylo is an interesting counterpoint, and it almost feels _illicit_ , to be making out in Kylo’s bed, and know he doesn’t need to sneak out in the morning, or avoid eye-contact if they bump into one another again.

Hands hold his face, thumbs sliding over his cheekbones, and fingers curling around his jaw as they make out, and Hux pushes his fingers into Kylo’s silver-black hair as he rocks his groin against his lover’s. It’s not targeted, but they don’t need to rush to the finish line tonight, so Hux is enjoying the change in pace. No one will storm in on them, and he’s pretty sure Kylo wouldn’t object to his time being spent on foreplay of the real kind. 

When they pause the kisses, Hux drops his forehead onto Kylo’s, shifting his weight so he can get their dicks to roughly line up between them, so when he grinds, they slide together. 

Kylo isn’t a small man. Hux is very aware of that, and he’s definitely interested... if a little nervous. It’s been a _long_ time since someone entered him, other than past the lips. But he can’t stop thinking about it, and how good it would feel inside of him. Kylo doesn’t seem to suffer from ‘can’t fill it all the way up’, which Hux knows sometimes is an issue with someone so well endowed, but...

“Have you got lube?” he asks, moving his hands to Kylo’s shoulders, sliding his own dick against the other’s belly.

“Yeah. I mean, it doesn’t go off, does it? Kinda only used it... you know. Solo.”

“Kylo, it’s not a spermicide we need it for. I don’t plan on eating it, just using it internally. If it’s sticky, it’s in date.”

“Well I _figured_ it wasn’t for contraceptive use,” Kylo huffs, though he’s clearly a little embarrassed by his question.

“...sorry,” Hux mumbles. “I’m not used to – you know – being _nice_ to people. Things just... come out before I can think about it.”

“I just... want this to go right, is all.”

“Hey, Ky, it’s going _so_ much better than I ever could have dreamed. If I’m – uh – if I’m... too ‘me’, you should know I... do it automatically, not because... shit. That doesn’t sound any better, does it?”

“Not much,” Kylo admitted. “But I get it. I’m... I’m prone to my own emotional outbursts. I think if we... try to notice if we’re doing that...?”

“I might not _stop_ it, but I might realise I did it and apologise?”

Kylo nods. “We’re not going to be perfect.”

“If nothing else, we’re both... emotional men, who have... gotten set in our ways.” Once upon a time, Hux would have never admitted he was emotional. His sense of self had been too warped, and he’d believed he was that thing Brendol had wanted: the perfect soldier, the perfect officer. He hadn’t been able to reconcile his temper with what he was supposed to be.

Now, though... now he can look back through his memories and see when he was short-tempered. Can see the times he was the aggressor, poking Kylo for a reaction.

It’s weird how it’s taken him this long to know who he actually is. What if there’s other parts of his personality he’s utterly blind to? What if he never...

“Hux?”

“Huh?”

“You... you alright?”

“I was... yes. I was just thinking how... little I understand myself.”

“You know, most people don’t know who they are.”

“You’re just saying that to console me, so I get back to the sex.”

“...whilst getting back to the sex _would_ be nice, I’m serious. Most people don’t look too closely at themselves. Seeing where you’re wrong, or could be better... that’s hard, Hux.”

“Most people aren’t mass-murderers.”

“You wonder how many of them _would_ have been, in your situation?”

“...not really.”

“Think about it, sometime. Think about the pressure, the things you had drummed into you. Think about how you second-guessing yourself now is more than nearly every person does. If you want proof: just look at my parents. Wonderful war heroes. Generals. Politicians. ‘Saved’ the galaxy... but used to scream at each other if they disagreed. A father terrified of his son, and a mother who sent her child away when she couldn’t cope. Don’t... don’t think that even the ‘good’ people are good.”

“There’s spousal abuse and child neglect, and then there’s genocide, Kylo.”

“...quantity doesn’t make things better, or worse.”

“I’m not sure I agree. One speeding ticket is less than ten.”

“And don’t forget they blew up two Death Stars, and one Starkiller, and how many others?”

Hux pauses, sitting properly up on his haunches. They did. They did. He forgets that, at times, though the Empire and Order lost combatants, and he destroyed civilians. It’s not as easy, is it? He hadn’t killed them out of malice for them, or even from not caring. In his head, it had been a very logical decision. 

“I... derailed the moment, didn’t I?”

“A little,” Kylo admits.

“I just... I’m... me?”

“And you’re learning who that is. I understand, better than most. I’ve lived my life bouncing between people who either thought they knew who I _was_ , or could make me be what they wanted. Finding out who I really was, and wanted to be...”

“...did you know I’d have... these problems, when you invited me to stay?”

“If you want the honest truth, I thought you’d handle it even less well than this. But all I had to go off was... how it was for me. And believe me, it took me _time_.”

“You did it... alone.”

Kylo nods.

Alone. Hux was alone, after the war, but he’d choked his days up with survival, and what did he have to speak for it? A small spaceship, a smaller wardrobe, an efficient arsenal, wear and tear on his joints, some scars, and some stories. 

Kylo made a home, a business, and a real inroads into his psyche. 

Hux has never been what he wanted, has he? He’d once hated Kylo for the inherited ‘easy’ path, which it now looks like was even less healthy and supportive than his own, and here the man’s made himself something.

He wants to run, but a hand around the back of his neck makes their eyes meet.

“It was easier, for me. I’d already switched once. I had everyone’s voices in my head, so it was... when they left, it was easier for me to find the one that was me.”

“That makes no sense, Kylo.”

“Why not? I knew the extremes, and who they belonged to. Whatever I decided in the middle... it was me, not them.”

They were supposed to be having sex, not an emotional discussion. This was _lube_. “How can you stand to be around me, when I do this over a simple question?”

“Because... because if I wanted someone just for sex, you think I couldn’t have found them?”

“So I’m just your punishment? Your atonement?”

“Why won’t you accept someone could like _you_?”

“Maybe because _I don’t like me very much, so why should you_?”

Shit. Okay. Really spoiling the moment now, wasn’t he? What is wrong with him? Is he so averse to his own happiness that he’ll sabotage even the slightest chance of—Kylo grabs his wrist as he tries to leave, and he snaps, trying to pull free.

“Hux... I don’t love you just because you’re broken. If I wanted a _charity_ case, there’s plenty of those in the galaxy, too.”

“Then: Why. Me?” 

“If I tell you, you have to believe me.”

“I’ll believe you if you’re believable.”

Kylo’s nostrils flare in annoyance. “ _Not_ what I asked.”

“I can’t promise I’ll blanket believe something you say, without knowing what it is!”

“Fine! I’ve been in love with you for years, you idiot. I fell in love with you on the _Finalizer_ , but I didn’t do anything about it. I haven’t fallen in love with anyone, since, and until you walked back into my life by way of the front door, I thought you were dead. But no, the Force gave me a second chance. A chance to make you notice me.”

“That’s the most – the most preposterous – we barely spoke! I mean, civilly...”

“Yes, it is, isn’t it? But you were so driven, so fierce, so smart, so bold. You made me laugh, inside my own head. You made me want to be better at what I did. You made me want to show off, to get your attention. I was crushing on you from almost day one, and then you moved back into my life and you were even better than I thought.”

Hux rolls onto his back, the sheets curled around his lap. He doesn’t know how to deal with that. How do you cope with knowing your co-worker for years crushed on you, and you didn’t even notice? And how does he even... how?

“See. You thought... I don’t know what you thought. But I’m pathetic, and I just wanted you, and... I’m sorry you can’t see yourself how I see you.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

“...I wasn’t supposed to... you know. Have relations. And then you were dead for over ten years, and then I didn’t want to scare you off.”

Hux thinks about it for a moment longer. He’s still naked in Kylo’s bed, in Kylo’s home, where he’s now resident. Kylo’s never forced the issue, or demanded a relationship. It’s only because Hux is in the middle of his third existential crisis of the day that this has even come to light at _all_. 

“Were you ever planning on telling me?”

“...when it wouldn’t... when it wouldn’t feel like I was trapping you, or guilting you into a relationship, I suppose.”

“And you know this makes me look like a dick?”

“...how?”

“For not... returning your feelings all those years, or even – hells – noticing?”

“I made sure you didn’t. Not... by altering your thoughts, just by hiding it.”

Hux wonders how life would have been, if they’d tried this back twenty years ago? Probably even less pleasant, as Hux-then was less personable than Hux-now. 

“Where do we go from here?” Hux asks.

“...where do you want to go from here?”

“I’m not sure. I mean... I still... I’m _very_ fond of you. But you... you... all those years...”

“I’m just trying to tell you: there’s _so much_ of you to love. There always has been. You’re not a broken blaster for me to mend, you’re... you’re you. And I’ve always admired you.”

How? Why? What is there about him to love? Is it just physical? What even is love? Hux is not sure he’s ever felt it, and now he thinks that, he feels even more deficient than he did before. Shit. Shit, shit, shit. 

He’s too broken for love. Lust is fine, but love... 

The heels of his hands push against his closed eyes.

“If you didn’t care about me, you wouldn’t worry you weren’t enough for me to love,” Kylo murmurs, stroking hands over his thighs. “You care about me. Maybe not love, maybe not yet, but... you want to be good enough for me.”

“That’s not love, that’s pride!”

“If you were proud, you’d already think you were enough.”

Hux feels that like a knife through the ribs. It’s not pride, it’s a desperate need to be enough. To be enough, because he needs others’ opinions of him. He’s not self-sufficient, he’s... he’s...

“How do I know if I love you, too?” he asks, his throat sore.

“Does it hurt like hell? Do you want nothing more, but you’re also terrified? Do you want me happy and safe, more than anything else? And you want to be around me, even not for any reason? Do you—“

“ _All those things_ ,” Hux admits, suddenly horrified. “How did you know before me?”

“If you didn’t love me, you’d have made a terrible joke about the lube making more fart noises, jumped my bones, and... we’d be arguing about the damp patch, right about now.”

“So love is... not wanting sex?”

“No, love is... wanting things as well as sex. Or instead of. You know.”

Hux has never shared a bed with someone who he hasn’t had sex with. Well, other than top-tailing with someone in a bunk, but now he’s thinking about the concept and realising it sounds pretty... terrifyingly great.

“We could... I mean, would you be--?”

Kylo gently tugs him back into the bed properly. “Why don’t we cuddle for now, and see if we feel like it in the morning?”

“You... you wouldn’t... feel you missed out?”

“Hux, you idiot, you’re more than your body to me. I’d live with you without sex, if it was how I got to have you in my life.”

That sends a faint, distant tingle through him, but Hux tells it to shut up. He wants to do this, to prove something.

“On one condition,” he says, looking over at his bedmate.

“You want me to agree without knowing what it is?” he throws back at him.

Hux nods. “Yes. It’s this: if I start getting all... ridiculous in the morning? Shut me up with a kiss. I’m not saying do it every time, but...”

Kylo laughs. “Okay. Just this once.” 


	14. Chapter 14

Hux spends the night in Kylo’s bed, and wakes up to pins and needles in one arm, from the hulk of a man lying over it. They’ve turned in the night, apparently, and Kylo’s head is over his arm, and their foreheads are all but touching. Hux’s knees bend in slightly, also nearly touching Kylo’s, in a mirror image.

“Hey,” Kylo says.

“Hey yourself.”

“You sleep okay?”

“Apparently so... any chance I could get my arm back?”

“Oh, sorry...” Kylo lifts his head, looking sheepish. “We must have snuggled in our sleep.”

“Yeah,” Hux says, pulling his hand back. He wriggles his fingers and scrunches up a fist or two, getting feeling back. “You sleep okay?”

“Better than I have in a while.”

Hux rubs his fist into his eyes, dislodging the night’s sleep. “I’m sorry I got emotional.”

“Hey, it’s okay. The first few years after realising I was madly in love with you, my best-case scenario for once I told you was you laughing.”

“...the worst-case?”

“You shooting me. Probably in the groin. Then the gut.”

Hux winces. “I’d... probably have thought you were joking, if I’m honest. I mean... we weren’t exactly _close_.”

“Maybe not by ‘normal’ standards, but by my standards, you were... uh...”

“Kylo, if you tell me I was your best friend, I may punch you. I was _awful_ to you, not that you were much better to me.” Hell, what would he have done if Kylo had flirted with him, or made any kind of overture? He’s almost certain he would have thought of it as mocking. Probably not so far as shooting, but maybe threatening to do it.

Hux had been very much married to his job at the time. Actually, almost literally. He couldn’t have had a love (or sex) affair with a subordinate, and really... a Knight of Ren or a civilian would have been his only real options, if he thinks about it. 

Back then, he hadn’t felt the need. 

“You weren’t my ‘best friend’, no, but you were someone I knew better than others.”

“And you still liked me?” Hux snorts. “You’re deficient.”

“Maybe, but are you going to hold it against me?”

“Not if it means I get to wake up next to you like this...” Definitely not. He reaches over to curl his fingers in Kylo’s silver-shot hair, feeling the softness as he scrunches. 

There’s a few more lines around his eyes, but those just mean he’s smiled and laughed some. Deep cracks around his mouth, and skin that’s softer than it has any right to be. He’s aged well (maybe better than Hux, even if there’s a few years to Kylo’s benefit). 

He’s maybe even more handsome now, or maybe it’s just that the few times he saw him unmasked in the Order, Kylo’s expression had been cloudier than Bespin. He hadn’t seen him smiling, or looking so open and relaxed. The grey in his hair is striking, and Hux just... he just wants to drown in those brown eyes.

“Has anyone told you how damn attractive you are, Kylo?”

“Oh, shut up. You can’t flatter me and get away with murder.”

“It isn’t flattery if it’s _true_.”

“Shut up!”

Hux pounces, pushing Kylo onto his back, moving to straddle his hips. He’s not going to let his stupid hang ups get in the way of a happy, healthy sex-life. Nope. He sits on Kylo’s (apparently already half-awake) lap, sliding his hands up and down his tight chest. “Oh, you are. You’re _gorgeous_. I could cover you with butter and eat you.”

“...isn’t it traditionally whipped cream and chocolate sauce?”

“Do you have either in your room?”

“Oh, so it’s just ‘my’ room?”

“...you haven’t officially invited me in, you know.”

“You _fell asleep in my bed_ , Hux.”

“...it would be rude of me to presume!”

But now Kylo is laughing, and his hands come up to his face, curling around his nose to cover his eyes and mouth. The bastard’s stomach jiggles under him as he stifles his amusement, and Hux tries to pull those hands away so he can see him.

“Let go!” Kylo snickers.

“No!”

“Stop it! You’re invited, okay? You’re invited to everything and anything, except using the toilet while I’m in the shower.”

“Kylo _why_ would I do that?”

“ _You never met my father, did you_?”

He... what? Hux stops fighting for his hands. “Kylo... you do know that’s not normal?”

“Yeah, well, he also spent more time with my Wookie uncle than he did my mother. _Normal_ was something that happened to other people.”

Maybe he shouldn’t tease, not after he’s just been... “Wait, so are we – uh – an official item now?”

“Hux, you _live with me_.”

“People live together and... aren’t! And... do the sex and... shut up, or I’ll go around reading the expiry dates on all your sexual lubricants.”

“Point,” Kylo concedes. “So... is that a yes?”

“That’s seriously how you’re going to seduce me?”

Kylo moves _fast_. One minute, Hux is straddling him, the next he’s been rolled underneath and he isn’t entirely sure how, but there’s a hand cradling his neck, and a man arched over him. His eyes are too close to look away from, and Hux bites his lip in anticipation.

“Would you prefer the traditional approach?” Kylo asks.

Before Hux has a chance to reply, though, there’s lips pressed to his, and he opens greedily. A tongue slips over his mouth, then slowly laps in deeper, and he’s lost to the sensation of it, and the hands that curl into his hair and scalp, sending warm tingles all the way through him. They kiss deeply, slowly, and when Kylo finally breaks from said kiss, Hux feels breathless and giddy.

“Yes.”

“To the approach, or--?”

“If you keep kissing me like that, you can have anything you want,” Hux reassures him.

Kylo is definitely good at kisses, and he gives Hux several more. Hux moves his hands down under the scrunched covers to Kylo’s hips and waist, trying to encourage him closer. They grind for a moment, and then Kylo lifts for air, his face going into Hux’s shoulder, warm and tickly.

“You still sure the lube won’t be gross?”

“Would you use it on _yourself_?”

“Yeah.”

“Then get it, for the love of the Force, Ky.”

Kylo leans over him, and Hux puffs the hair that falls into his face out of his eyes and mouth, fighting his own laugh. There’s a mumbled apology, and then Kylo’s shaking the closed bottle.

“We flipping a cred?” he asks.

“Think I’d quite like you to prep me. It’s been a while, and it would be a crime to turn down a dick like yours.”

Kylo pushes his hair into Hux’s mouth on _purpose_ this time, and he has to whack at him.

They move slightly, lying on their sides, facing one another. Hux bends his knee, spreading his legs enough for access, and is pleased when warm hands stroke all over his thighs, first. He should have known Kylo wouldn’t be a ‘jam it right in’ kind of a guy, but it’s still nice to know for sure.

His hand strokes dryly over his balls and just behind, and Hux combs his fingers through Kylo’s hair, breathing heavily at the teasing. He pushes his lips to the bend of his neck, biting lightly, lapping between his teeth. 

“Go on, finger me. You’re going to need to open me for that dick of yours.”

The encouragement has Kylo flipping open the bottle, squelching out the offending substance into his palm. It smells vaguely artificial-fruity, and Hux is amused.

“What?”

“You got... fruit lube.”

“I wanted to know what it tasted like, sue me.”

“It’s cu—aaah!”

It’s not a bad ‘aaah’, though, because there’s a finger drawing circles over his pucker, and _man_ has it ever been too long. He pushes back to get more, moaning as there’s a steady pressure, not quite getting inside of him. The first few moments are always blissful torture, when your body knows it wants, and isn’t getting. His poor ass has – well – he hasn’t played with his own ass in a long while, and other than maybe a finger or two from a one-night-stand, this is the most love in a _very_ long time.

“Good?” Kylo checks.

“Mmmmnh,” Hux agrees, and scratches his nails over Kylo’s perfect chest.

That does the trick, because there’s a sticky finger pushing in, and Hux rewards Kylo by squeezing at his pecs, kneading and clawing his nails in as he fucks back onto the hand. He keeps it just one finger for the longest, and Hux retaliates by dropping his head to bite over his collarbone and chest, his thumbs tuning Kylo’s nipples to the frequency he needs. 

Damn, but it’s good. He has to just grip for a moment, flexing his legs wider as two fingers start to stretch his hole. He’s perfectly relaxed, and trusts him utterly, and it makes this _so_ so much better. 

“So... am I allowed to say it, now?” Kylo asks, his tone a little... distant.

“Huh?”

“You know.”

“...if I knew, why would I go: huh?”

The third finger goes in, and they bend inside, making Hux shudder and grip him harder in surprise. It isn’t painful, or even uncomfortable, it just takes him by surprise.

“If I have to tell you, then I can’t say it!”

“If you’re saying it, I find out anyway!”

Seriously, he wants to argue when he’s sixty percent of his hand in his ass? 

“Hux... are you always this dense?”

“Obviously so, around y--- _ahhh ah ah ah right there oh fuck yes—_ “

Hux whimpers a very undignified sound, bouncing onto Kylo’s palm as he tries to get those fingers deeper. It’s so, so good. 

“You made it weird!”

“I made it weird? You’re the – would you just fucking say it?” Yes, he’s snapping, but he’s also struggling to multitask this much.

“You’re an asshole, and I love you.”

Oh. _Oh_. Now Hux feels like a shit, so he shoves Kylo onto his back and straddles him, watching his eyes. “I’ve never been in love before, but... I’m pretty sure I’m in love with you, too.”

“Only ‘pretty’ sure?”

“Why don’t you give me your damn dick and then ask me?” Hux suggests, trying to avoid the part where he’s an emotional mess, slapping Kylo’s hand away. “C’mon. Damnit. I’ve been wanting it since I saw it was on the menu.”

“Cock-hungry slut,” Kylo accuses, but holds his shaft still, and slaps it at his rump. 

“I’m happy to be a slut for _your_ cock. But if we’re really serious, then it’s the _only_ one. For me, anyway. Understand?”

“ _Perfectly_.”

“Then: _give me your damn cock, you asshole, I love you_ ,” Hux demands, sinking down and feeling like his whole insides are re-arranging to fit him.

Okay. Gonna take some getting used to. His hands brace on Kylo’s chest, feeling the tense muscle as he tries to get used to the stretch, the depth of penetration. It’s so good, and he has to breathe through the tremors deep inside.

“...you okay?” Kylo’s voice actually _squeaks_.

“Oh... _yes_ ,” Hux enthuses, and starts to roll at the waist, arching his spine and sinking further down.

“ _Fuck_ , but you feel good.”

“Could... say the same thing.” Hux is having a hard time focussing, but then there’s hands on his waist, and they encourage his movement just enough to make it impossible to stay still.

All of a sudden, they’re moving for real. Hux uses his knees and toes to rock his weight back and forth, and Kylo’s hands ease him up and down between, getting the most from the position. He’s split almost in half, and he throws his head back in keen satisfaction.

“Oh _fuck_ , Kylo!”

“Please don’t stop.”

“T-touch me? _Please_?”

Kylo nods, and there’s a hand around his cock. Massive, massive hand, and the slight stickiness from the lube reminds him _that hand was in his ass_ , and for some reason that makes him harder. Hux starts to lift himself almost _off_ Kylo, ramming down and then crying out when he gets the angle _just right_. Oh – oh – oh fuck right... just more... just a little...

“ _Please_?” Kylo asks.

Hux has no idea what he’s agreeing to, but he nods. He nods, and then he’s hurled onto his back, and Kylo’s hand leaves his cock, so he grabs it himself. He can barely work out how to touch it, though, because the bed is shaking from Kylo’s harsh coupling, slapping thigh-to-thigh, making his body throb and burn with it. The tension coils up his spine, and the hand he’s using is – he’s – 

“Ky!”

“ _Come for me_ ,” Kylo begs him.

Hux can’t help but obey, pulling the strings of come from his cock, mostly hitting his hand and belly in the process. He drops, but Kylo isn’t done with him, not right off. Even as his body shakes, his lover keeps moving. Over and over, what feels like forever. He’s pounding his prostate, and Hux calls out in low, fervid appreciation. 

_Yes, yes, yes, fuck yes, fuck – oh – fuck fuccccck ffff—_

When Kylo’s climax hits, it’s a snap of his hips and an inevitable, pooling warmth that floods him from the inside. It’s so, so, so good, and then Kylo’s head hits the pillow beside his own, so Hux turns to sleepily kiss at his cheek.

“That... was good, but I could do without the fruit,” he says, eventually.

“Then you can repay the debt you owe by buying us lube that doesn’t offend your nose for the rest of our lives.”

“I thought I was helping refugees, or orphans, or something?”

“Oh, right. Still, I think both is fair.”

“If you cook.”

“Deal.” 


	15. Chapter 15

**(Several months later)**

Hux walks into the shop from the small landing pad, pulling off his flying gloves. He walks into the shop proper, finding Kylo bent over his workbench.

By far the most profitable thing they sell will always be weapons. Someone will always want to buy one, even if very many of their customers barely know how to use one. It’s about fifty-fifty between the tourists and just-in-cases, when compared to the career killers. 

Still, if they do want to fire their blaster, Hux knows Kylo only sells safe, reliable models. Some of them have been through more hands than the buyers have decades on their life-span, but they’re good weapons all the same. 

Hux waits for Kylo to finish, slinging his thumbs into his pockets, leaning back on the wall. There’s a few new purchases in cabinets, a few spaces. They’re doing okay for money, and he’s not worried in the slightest. The scrap parts and ammo he picked up around his volunteer work (killing two birds with one hyperspace jump) will also help stuff their coffers. 

He always makes sure he doesn’t get anything really dangerous, if he’s carrying people. If he’s shipping donated food and clothes, though, then it’s fair game so long as he keeps the cargo split. 

Kylo puts down the welding tool and looks up, brushing his wrist over his slightly grimy forehead.

“Good trip?”

“Very.” Hux nods out back. “Be set for at least two weeks.”

“Something... happened?”

Hux should know by now that Kylo can read him, even without the Force. He’s not guarded around him, though sometimes the probing questions can still catch him off-guard. Doesn’t help that he’s still a bit spooked, though.

“Yeah. I was... I was shifting things for the ex-Order and ex-Hosnian charities, you know... moving educational things around. I just... I saw her.”

“...’her’?”

Kylo has to know. Phasma’s long gone, and so is Kylo’s mother. There’s only really one woman who would give them both reason to pause.

“Pretty sure it was her. She had the... you know. Saber. And the robes thing going on, though they weren’t all brown.”

“The... scavenger. Rey.”

Hux ducks his head, and a strand of hair betrays his order, falling into his face. “Yeah. It was her. She was volunteering, too. Though I thought a Jedi could do better than that.”

They both pause for a moment. She’d been the bane of their lives, and very nearly the end of them. Even if Kylo had briefly co-operated with her, and with Luke... she’d also been the one to slice him almost into shreds, and to take the position under Luke Skywalker that had – at one point – been his.

“I doubt she’d even remember I existed, you know? I was... I was a General, but I wasn’t the Leader. I thought I was something, back then, but I guess I wasn’t really anything. She probably never even knew my name...”

It’s humbling to realise that. He’d always tried to believe he was key, fundamental to the Order’s plans. But it had always been the Force, hadn’t it? The Force, and everyone else after it. 

“I think she would remember you,” Kylo replies. “But you were helping. If she did recognise you, she could... see you were different.”

“I don’t know what’s worse: being someone she forgot even existed, or being... so... pointless that she couldn’t even be angry when she saw me.”

“Hux, I’m sure she—“

“She asked me my name. I said... Hicks. Alec Hicks. I didn’t know what else to do, and she looked me in the eye and thanked me, and then she moved on.”

Of course _she_ can move on. It’s been years, and she ‘freed’ the galaxy from oppression. _She_ killed the Leader, with Kylo’s help. She’s got bigger things to think about than a lowly volunteer cargo pilot, who once destroyed five worlds.

Kylo grabs his upper arm, and looks him right in the eye. “Who you were... that you can’t change. Who you _become_ , you can.”

“I wanted to matter, Ky. I wanted to be someone, and what did I do? I killed more people than I could meet in my lifetime. That’s what ambition got me, and I’m _still_ upset because someone who might well have executed me didn’t recognise me?”

“Why does her opinion of you matter so much to you?”

“Because...” Because he couldn’t like himself enough, and so he craved it from others. That’s why. Someone important, like Rey. He wanted to be elevated, because maybe it would... 

It’s dumb. So dumb. She thanked him, the him he is now. He’s made lives better. Not as many as he’d ruined, but more than he would have done if he’d done nothing at all. He can’t possibly hope to make as big of an impact for ‘good’, and if he did, the limelight would show his greying hair for who is really underneath it.

Mediocrity is truly the great concealer.

“Because I... if I’m not even... if I’m not even recognised for the one big thing I did – even if it was _horrible –_ and how does that sound? I still want the infamy, without the lifetime imprisonment? The kudos? Or did I need her to punish me in front of everyone?”

“Hux... come here.” Kylo pushes his tools aside, and opens his arms up.

Hux reluctantly steps into his embrace, shuddering. “I don’t know. I just... it felt like it should have been different.”

“Who you are now is someone Rey could thank. Who you are now is all the good you do, for those you do it for.”

“I’m nobody, now. I guess... my father was right after all.”

“You don’t need to... you don’t need the galaxy to notice you to matter, Hux. Everyone knew my name – or it felt like it – and I wasn’t happy at all. Here... with you?”

Hux gulps. “I’m sorry.”

“What for?”

“Forgetting the only real opinion that matters.”

“It isn’t _mine_ ,” Kylo reminds him. “Even if I’m ridiculously proud of you.”

“It’s my own,” Hux agrees. All that time thinking if others could validate him, it would patch over the gaping hole inside. 

“Are you who you want to be?”

A man with a home, a lover, a job... making a difference. Making lives better. Respected, and loved. 

It’s not what he set out for, but...

“Yes,” he says, and realises it’s not so bad to not be recognised as who he was. He definitely isn’t that person any more, even if he did do all the things that other-self did. The other-self didn’t know as much as he knows now.

Kylo kisses his forehead. “Come on, I’ll start dinner. It’s been a quiet day, anyway. I’d rather spend the rest of it with you.”

With a flick of the Force, the sign goes from **Open** to **Closed** , and they walk hip-to-hip into their private rooms. 

He mustn’t forget the surprise he brought back, though, but that can wait til after they eat.


	16. Chapter 16

Once dinner is over and done with, they let food settle while they watch the holos Kylo’s saved in his absence. Hux tucks his feet under his butt, and leans against his lover’s shoulder, feeling pleasantly buzzed. There’s no chores to do, no obligations hanging over their heads, and this is just their time.

Kylo’s worn fingertips whorl little shapes onto his neck, and he tilts his head to offer more space for that. It’s comforting, reassuring, and familiar. The smell of solder and ozone clings to Kylo’s clothes and hands, and Hux likes it.

“What do you think... they would say, if they found us here?”

“You mean... the New Jedi?”

His parents and uncle are all gone. The only ones who really remember Before now are the droids, and the Wookie. Or... he’s the only one he’d never read an obituary for. He nods, and peers up.

“I like to think they realise I... well. I can’t say I’ve paid every debt off, but I did help bring down Snoke. I’m obviously not causing trouble. I like to think they’d be glad I found peace.”

“You ever think how your life would have been without the Force?”

“Frequently. I think I’d have had an easier time of it, to begin with, but... maybe you needed me?” He says it very, very lightly.

It’s clear he’s nervous saying it, and Hux realises his sudden silence could be... worrying to him. “Kylo, do you... do you really think the Force would ask you to go through what you went through, for... one person?”

“No, it’s more complicated than that. I did help take down Snoke, though. Would they have managed that without me? Maybe. And... you... did need me, didn’t you?”

“More than I could ever put into words.” He grabs the ponytail behind Kylo’s head, turning him to meet his eyes. “I do need you, still. But I’d rather not be the cause for you suffering. My happiness isn’t that important.”

“It is, to me.”

Four words, and Hux just... oh, stars. He means it. He means it, and he’d do it all over again? That does it, and he leaps up, swinging a leg over him, kneeling on his lap and keeping his head pulled back. “Ky...”

“I love you.”

He uses the other hand under his jaw, holding him still to kiss his lips fiercely. A scrunch of mouths together, and then a swipe of his tongue, demanding Kylo opens up. Even when he does, he licks the inside of his lips, teasing over and over before he slips his tongue further in. He tugs at the hair tie, letting Kylo’s hair fall down in a sigh, and his hands shift, his thumbs on his cheeks as his fingers sink into the soft curls.

Kylo below him wraps his arms around him, his warm palms stroking slowly over his sides, up his back, across his shoulders. Every inch of contact makes his blood bubble, and Hux breaks the kiss to drop his forehead to Kylo’s. 

“See... worth it,” Kylo says, his voice a little caught.

“Yeah, and you didn’t even see your gift, yet.”

“I get a gift _as well_ as you?”

“Yep.”

“...can I fall to the Dark Side again, if this is what I get?”

Hux snaps his teeth near Kylo’s nose, and pushes himself to glide chest-to-chest as his feet slip down to the floor. “Bed. Now.”

***

Kylo sits on the bed where he’s pushed, and Hux stands between his parted legs. Their fingers make light work of clothing, but they would be going faster if they weren’t distracted by kisses and tracing scars and marks. Hux is just as guilty, and by the time he’s down to his socks alone, he has to make a conscious effort not to leave them on. 

“You can’t tell a man you got him a gift and then not give it to him,” Kylo complains, somewhere above his navel. His huge hands hold his waist, and Hux fights giggles at the tickly kisses. 

“Well you keep distracting me.”

“Is that a tactful ‘stop kissing me’?” Kylo asks, and then pushes his lips in harder, making a seal and starting to suckle to the left of his bellybutton.

“Ky!”

“Mnnnff?”

Laughing, he whacks him, and dances back to his overnight bag, dropping and making sure Kylo gets a good view of his crack as he does so. He lingers a little longer than usual, and then comes back with a small box.

“What is it?”

“You could open it.”

Rolling his eyes, Kylo does so. He finds the two vibrators – sleek, red, matching – and little palm-size devices.

“So?”

“So... we each slip one in, and the flare keeps it in, and then we can control one another’s toys. Leaving our mouths and cocks free...”

“So... sixty-nine while we’re stuffed with toys?”

“One of many, many options,” Hux agrees. “But definitely a good one.”

“You pervert.”

“You say it like it’s a bad thing.”

***

With a little effort, they get pillows for heads and one between their knees. Hux parts his legs for the slick fingers that stroke around his hole, and he tries to keep his touches in synch, echoing Kylo’s touches. A gentle penetration with a finger, and he kisses Kylo’s thighs and belly, ignoring his swelling cock for now. He needs to be able to focus, after all. 

There’s a soft nip of teeth against his leg, and Hux lifts his head to see. 

“Ready?” Kylo asks.

Because he’s a shit, Hux shoves the toy in half-way, and then twists it. “Yep.”

Kylo snorts, and returns the favour. 

Whilst he’s easing the dildo in, Hux starts to nuzzle his nose against Kylo’s balls, pushing at them and making them drop after each lift. The toy is slender to begin with, but it soon opens to wide. There’s a relatively big flare near the base, enough to make it easier to keep inside without causing any discomfort. It’s not the biggest of toys they own, but the controls looked good for adjusting when ‘busy’, and he liked the identical pair, too.

Once it’s all the way in, Hux slips the vibration on low, and peers up to watch his lover’s face. His eyes are closed, his mouth agape as he thrusts back against it, and then there’s a low buzz inside.

“Good gift,” comes the strained sound.

“...agreed.”

He uses his nose and lips to push Kylo’s cock up and against his belly, and starts to kiss softly. Little feathery touches, as he slides the intensity up and down, never going to the top of the scale. He lets the tip of his tongue stroke delicately, chasing the shape of him, tasting the day and musk. It’s so oddly intimate, this, feeling his own cock licked and lapped as he offers his own touches, and he slips a hand between his legs to stroke fingers around his stretched pucker, humming in pleasure as he flicks the toy to start thrusting: expanding and contracting, like a gentle fucking.

The noises of delight from Kylo are worth it, and then Kylo finds another switch and _his_ toy starts to grind like it’s a spiral, screwing itself ever deeper but actually never getting further in. It _feels_ like it, and he wraps his lip around the head of Kylo’s cock, suckling his cheeks nearly hollow. 

One problem about a very devoted, very... competitive lover is trying to keep up. Hux is aware they’ll both try to One Up the other, but at least if they’re fighting to please the other the most, then they both win, no matter what.

Kylo’s lips slide down his shaft, taking him deep, deep inside. Wet, warm, wonderful... and the pulsing kicks up a notch. He’s not going to last anywhere near as long as he wants if Kylo keeps that up, but Hux doesn’t care. He suckles harder on the head, and then starts to bob up and down as he puts the toy on the highest intensity, on a rapidly-switching program. That done, he puts the control down, and starts jerking his hand around the base of his lover’s shaft, the other hand rubbing firmly behind his balls, trying to stimulate his prostate from the outside.

There’s an odd choking feel around his cock as Kylo splutters, and then they’re both wrestling to see who can do and give the most. A blur of hands, mouths, toys, and thrusting... and Hux is in absolute heaven. He can’t keep up mentally with the physical contact, he just knows they’re both a mass of sweaty, horny, rutting pleasure.

When he comes, it’s a relief. His body tightens around the toy, and he has to pause his sucking, his hand still jerking Kylo’s shaft as he spills into his lover’s mouth. The pleasure seems to stretch out as the toy doesn’t leave up, and he’s whining in soft protest until the intensity is turned down. 

Hux lifts his head for a moment, panting, and then he smiles up at Kylo, who is rubbing his face against Hux’s spent cock. His lips glisten, and that sends an abortive bolt of pleasure back through him.

A breath. Two. Three. He kisses his thigh again, and then drops his mouth around his lover. 

_Use me_ , he thinks, and lets go of his cock to smack his ass, trying to get him to thrust. 

Kylo’s hand comes down, holding his head still as he starts to buck into his mouth, moaning loudly now he’s free of Hux’s shaft. “H-hux, I’m... I’m... _right there yes oh yes oh fuck_ —“

With no small amount of focus, Hux swallows the whole load. His mouth is raw, his ass tingling, but he feels... wonderful. 

It’s a few moments more before Kylo grabs his pillows, flipping to come lie down nose-to-nose. Their toys are still snug inside of them, but turned down to almost nothing but a faint buzz. It’s nice, and Hux feels vague and dreamy. He’ll fall asleep if he’s not careful, but Kylo looks just as exhausted.

“You are worth everything,” Kylo murmurs.

Hux kisses the lies from his lips. “Well, I better never leave, then,” he jokes. 

“Don’t. Not ever.”

“I won’t, Ky. I won’t.” 

**Author's Note:**

>  
> 
> Artwork by the lovely [@Vaticansaint](http://sithofren.tumblr.com/post/156944837605/patched-broken-things-patched-up-work-good)

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Delayed](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10375533) by [Davechicken](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Davechicken/pseuds/Davechicken)
  * [Too Good At Gifts](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10700772) by [Davechicken](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Davechicken/pseuds/Davechicken)




End file.
